As presidential candidates rhetorically articulate their beliefs during presidential debates, they reveal a lot about their underlying ideological beliefs. These beliefs were examined through the lens of an established methodology called the Operational Code, which uses a program to decipher a candidate's beliefs through what they say in debate transcripts. In this study, the belief trends of the Operational Codes of all presidential candidates from 1976-2012 were examined through a rhetorical lens, and it was found that rhetoric was indeed the driving force for the apparent changes in Operational Code beliefs. These changes were examined on a greater level of detail through four case studies, which illustrated the changes in Operational Code beliefs and rhetoric of Ronald Reagan, the incumbent presidential candidates, the 2004 election, and lastly, with the independent presidential candidates.

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This dissertation is a rhetorical study of the critical reception of the French film Hiroshima mon amour (1959; dir.: Alain Resnais; screenplay: Marguerite Duras). My main argument is that the themes of love and technology followed a dialectical progression in the critical reception of Hiroshima mon amour. They were important and politically charged in the first essays on the film at the turn of the Sixties. But they lost momentum and became more neutral due to the academization of Film Studies and to the rise of semiology that privileged linguistic abstractions. The return of the themes of love and technology in the Eighties signals the search for renewed forms of commitment. However, this commitment "through abstraction" is also predicated on forgetting. In fact, a different understanding of commitment does not allow remembering that Hiroshima mon amour was also a protest against the first French atomic test in Algeria and its colonial implications. My dissertation examines the limits of what can be said through different paradigms of criticism and commitment through the careful study of the rhetorical situation of each critical act. Jacques Derrida's twin concepts of aimance and of the peut-être guide my research. I examine how we can think Hiroshima mon amour on the background of the paradoxical communities that invented new forms of political participation in postwar France. The early debate on the representation of "mad love" in Resnais' film signaled a concern for the way in which modern technology undermined the binary oppositions between war/peace, civilian/military, and friend/enemy. The paradoxical communities that originated from this realization opened to rhetorical articulations that united people with no communal party membership. Derrida's politics of aimance carries on this reflection on the peut-être by targeting the traditional view that envisions the political as limited to the public sphere and tend to exclude women. By contrast, Hiroshima mon amour empowered women because it tapped into the dark territories of the private in order to show that modern technology had colonized the intimate and daily life. Hence, women critics could acquire a strong political voice from the oppression of the private.

This essay examines the epideictic genre by using qualitative method to analyze acceptance speeches from the Swedish Grammy awards. These speeches and their speakers are often described as rhetorically mediocre and there seems to be a notion within the music community that an acceptance speech is personal and without deeper meaning. From a functionalistic perspective on genre, these speeches can be seen as working together with other genres that carry information about the winners. Why would skilled performers who know how to entertain an audience choose to repeat rhetorical mistakes? This essay uses different perspectives on rhetorical situation and genre as well as multimodal analysis of verbal- and nonverbal communication, to argue that these particular speeches in this particular situation come with their own set of expectations and values that the speakers have to acknowledge if they are to meet the epideictic purpose: To unite the audience around common values and create an enjoyable collective memory. The results show that most of the winners do so by multimodal activity where verbal and nonverbal communication work together to highlight values that are part of each winner’s persona as well as values that are celebrated within the music community as a whole.

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In this dissertation, I analyze the organizational and political constraints that technical writers encounter when dealing with complex rhetorical situations, particularly within risk-management discourse. I ground my research in case studies of safety briefings that airlines provide to their passengers because these important documents have long been regarded as ineffective, yet they ve gone largely unchanged in the last 20 years. Airlines are required to produce these safety briefings, which must satisfy multiple audiences, such as corporate executives, federal safety inspectors, flight attendants, and passengers. Because space and time are limited when presenting safety information to passengers, the technical writers must negotiate constraints related to issues such as format, budget, audience education and language, passenger perceptions/fears, reproducibility, and corporate image/branding to name a few. The writers have to negotiate these constraints while presenting important (and potentially alarming) information in a way that s as informative, realistic, and tasteful as possible. But such constraints aren t unique to the airline industry. Once they enter the profession, many writing students will experience complex rhetorical situations that constrain their abilities to produce effective documentation; therefore, I am looking at the theories and skills that we re teaching our future technical communicators for coping with such situations. By applying writing-style and visual-cultural analyses to a set of documents, I demonstrate a methodology for analyzing complex rhetorical situations. I conclude by proposing a pedagogy that teachers of technical communication can employ for helping students assess and work within complex rhetorical situations, and I offer suggestions for implementing such practices in the classroom.

This project seeks to mediate one of the most significant issues with implementing writing groups in the secondary classroom: students do not know how to meaningfully engage in discussions about their writing. Students lack the necessary skills as well as understanding of the rhetorical nature of language to effectively request and provide feedback on pieces of writing. The application of theories of dialogue and collaboration to the research about writing groups suggest that the quality of student writing depends on the quality of their discussions about writing. Thus, my action research study investigates the types of language used between students in writing groups. I audio recorded students' writing group discussions and asked students to reflect on their experience in a written survey. Drawing on recorded small group conversations and student reflections, I consider how secondary students' rhetorical approach to writing groups allows them to collaboratively make meaning and improve their writing. The following research question guided my work: What rhetorical skills and understanding are necessary for meaningful participation in writing groups? In this context, meaningful participation is defined as productive discussions wherein comments build on one another as students create meaning and generate new ideas together. This was evaluated by the students themselves in their written reflections as well as my analysis of the recorded group discussions. Thematic analysis revealed that students who have an awareness of the rhetorical situation as well as skills such as responding and questioning are better able to participate meaningfully in writing groups.

Based on the concept of rhetorical situation, the purpose of this study is to compare and describe the three Socialist leader's May Day speech from the years 1954, 1978 and 2011. The results of the analysis showed that there is a big difference in how the leaders chooses to appeal to the rhetorical audience. Erlander, 1954, never appealed directly to his audience which Palme, 1978, did both initially as repeatedly throughout his speech. Juholt, 2011, has a personal and frequent appeal which is repeated throughout his speech, which is interpreted as a sign of the intimization of the public language. It proved difficult to discuss the Socialist rhetoric as one unified form. The rhetoric realm is influenced by too many external factors, such as the media, which makes it impossible to speak of it as one. The analysis revealed that the language of the 1th may-speeches is characterized by the people who use it. It is inevitable that the speaker puts his utmost emphasis, in both language and speeches. It would require a larger and more comprehensive analysis to allow any conclusions about a social-democratic language.Keywords: Rhetorical situation, genre, ethos-logos-pathos, 1th May, the Swedish Social Democratic Party, Tage Erlander, Olof Palme, Håkan Juholt

While numerous studies on academic writers composing for non-academic audiences exist, few if any studies address academic writers composing biographies for children. This self-reflective case study of a Eudora Welty biography for children provides insight into how an academic writer can effectively write in a specific genre (biography) for a specific audience (children) and into practical rhetorical choices such as choosing photographs and designing page layouts. The study also offers triangulated data regarding essential criteria of quality children’s literature as identified by experts in the field (editors, publishers, award committee members, scholars, and authors). The author’s findings include sixty-eight of the most often cited criteria, such as accuracy and the use of documented evidence, that serve as guidelines and a means of evaluating biographies written for children.

The Authorities attitudes towards Gypsies have been characterized by prejudice for a long time. This has lead to the relief actions of the Authorities being formed by discriminating acts. In purpose of eliminating the discrimination of the Gypsies, the Delegation for Gypsy matters formulated a strategy for solving this problem in the report “Gypsy rights – a strategy for Gypsies in Sweden”. Despite the goodwill of the Authorities this report has been criticized by Gypsies in Sweden.   In the investigation of the derivation of this criticism the aim of this essay is to look at how the Authorities attitude towards Gypsies is shown in this report and how it affects the creation of their ethos. This analysis is made with a Critical Linguistic Analysis and the Stasis Theory.    The result showed that the Delegation for Gypsy matters dissociate themselves from the former attitudes that characterized the Authorities view of Gypsies. Through this move they try to show solidarity with them. Despite this equality aim it is possible to make note of an authoritative touch that imply a view of a society where the power is distributed from the top to the bottom. Even the picture of the Gypsies as a weak group can be noted. / Myndigheters attityder har länge varit präglade av fördomar när det gäller romer. Detta har medfört att deras hjälpinsatser för att förbättra romernas situation har präglats av diskriminerande åtgärder. I syfte att komma bort från den diskriminerande behandlingen av romerna utformade Delegationen för romska frågor en strategi för hur detta problem kunde lösas. Detta nya betänkande har dock fått kritik från romer i Sverige. För att undersöka vad denna kritik beror på är syftet med den här uppsatsen att undersöka hur myndigheters attityder gentemot romer kommer till uttryck i betänkandet samt hur detta påverkar skapandet av myndigheternas ethos. Detta görs genom en kritisk lingvistisk analys av textens verbprocesser, negationer och passivkonstruktioner. Detta resultat kopplas sedan till statusläran. Resultatet som framkommit ur analyserna är att Delegationen för romska frågor tydligt tar avstånd från myndigheternas tidigare attityder och förhållningssätt. Genom detta försöker de istället solidarisera sig med romerna. Trots denna strävan efter jämlikhet går det att uttyda auktoritära drag som antyder en samhällssyn där styrandet sker uppifrån och ned. Även drag av romer som en svag grupp går att utläsa.