In searching for an opinion piece, I have found that I am mostly drawn to political or socio-political subjects. I am also drawn to pieces on subjects like health, environmental, activism, and music. More than anything else, it is the topic of writing which draws my interest. I am more likely to read an article on something I am passionate about than, say, the latest celebrity scandal.
Within these subjects, I am particularly attracted by certain attributes in the author’s writing style. Specifically, I really enjoy articles with a lot of wit and personality. A bit of sarcastic humor always makes a paper more enjoyable to me. This is especially true within political and socio-political pieces. Humor really makes a piece of writing easier to follow; thus the phrase “comic relief.”
An engaging title is also extremely important. When browsing through editorials and opinion pieces, it is common for one to look only at the titles of articles. If the title is not engaging, or doesn’t catch your attention, it may never even be looked at.
Authors use rhetorical strategies to attempt to make their articles more appealing. These strategies are very powerful tools, and I think they all have their place. Every one works with me, at least some of the time. If the article uses kairos then it is more appealing because I know it’s about something current, and not something that is outdated. Ethos can make believing the author a lot easier. Pathos can make me feel an emotional response that helps get their opinion across to me, and as many things provide a single universal response, it can help unite me with the opinion of the author. This makes me read with the grain, as opposed to against it. Logos can also be effective, although of all the rhetorical strategies, this is probably the least powerful to me. I know that “facts,” statistics, numbers, graphs, etc. can misguide readers. In fact, many of them may be complete lies. So I am not always prone to let logos rhetoric work on me.
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