In
structions:
Record five rhetorical strategies that Maria W. Stewart uses in her 1832 lecture and explain their
effect on the audience.
Rhetorical Strategy
Metaphor
Intended Effect on Audience
In the first paragraph, Steward uses a
metaphor “yet confined by the chains of
ignorance and poverty to lives of continual
drudgery and toil”. She likens the weight and
restrictions of ignorance and poverty to that of
heavy chains restricting ones movement. This
helps the audience to feel just some of the
pain that the slaves that had “noble souls
aspiring after high and honorable
acquirements” did
Simile
Maria. W. Stewart uses Similes: “the ideas
become confined, the mind barren, and, like
the scorching sands of Arabia, produces
nothing; or, like the uncultivated soil, brings
forth thorns and thistles.”. This specific
rhetorical device enables the audience to
picture said “ideas” and liken them to that of
the barren, scorching sands of Arabia. These
are simile’s because Steward uses the word
“like”.
Allusion
Allusion is used in Stwards speech when she
alludes to the famous desserts of Arabia. This
helps the audience understand other
rhetorical devices because it is seen as a
simile too.
Rhetorical question
“And have you not a similar class among
yourselves?”. Usually, when asking a question
during a speech, the speaker is not actually
looking for an answer but rather looking to
evoke a certain emotion in the audience such
as Steward does here. In the context of the
speech she is looking to evoke uproar and a
call to action.
Metaphor
“that our souls have caught the flame also,
ragged as we are”. In this excerpt, Steward
uses a metaphor to liken their souls relaising
something to being set alight by a “flame”.
This helps the audience to feel the
empowered emotion the speaker has by
representing it as a flame.