Questions to Consider
- Bentley writes that the stickers take on a voice of their own, becoming the speaker as well as the artifact. How does Bentley convey the way the artifact speaks and what does the artifact’s voice do?
- Bentley describes the significance of the artifact in its ability to invoke certain emotions in various audiences and explains how the artifact lends credibility to the wearer of the artifact. Identify two of the instances where he describes pathos and then explain how you understand the artifact to be enhancing the credibility of the wearer.
- In his reflection, Bentley talks about beginning his outline with personal experience about the artifact, or his prior knowledge as a member of the community, before moving towards rhetorical analysis. How do you see this personal story or background knowledge weaved into his rhetorical analysis?
A Note From the Instructor
Ty Young
John’s essay was a perfect example of rhetoric in everyday life hiding in plain sight. The best thing about his artifact is its kariotic nature. As he mentions in his essay, the helmet stickers travel from little league teams all the way to college teams. Using a universal artifact helped him connect to rhetoric in his life when lessons were not enough to convince him of the importance of rhetoric.
I am confident this essay will help others connect to rhetoric as well since the artifact used was easy to understand, but had much to be analyzed by someone within the community who thought they were privy to the understanding of the stickers. John was able to pick out pathos, ethos, and logos without declaring it to his audience upfront, but instead in a matter of fact way. This approach helps with the overall comprehension of his analysis by those who are still learning how to create a rhetorical analysis themselves. His essay is a perfect learning tool for those who are looking for exceptional rhetorical analysis examples.
Rhetorical Analysis Essay
How could such a tiny artifact in a small community of less than a thousand people have had such a clear and powerful impact on those who had viewed it? This question comes to mind when considering the effect the batting helmet sticker had on the Mount Pisgah Baseball community. The batting helmet stickers were awarded to players one at a time for important, “highlight” plays or as a player of the game award. Naturally, certain players began to accumulate stickers at a far faster pace than others, and players that really earned a lot had a certain mystique about them, as the rows of stickers were quite visually striking. The stickers themselves are small in size, which speaks to their ability to communicate effectively. This is further reinforced by the stickers themselves simply being the school logo. Although simple, the school logo instills another layer of pride in the player, as each player wants to perform well for the school and the team. The helmet stickers also show us how ethos and pathos can be communicated visually to the Mount Pisgah Baseball community incredibly effectively, all with a tiny logo and without a single word.
The stickers mainly communicate visually to the audience through the number of stickers a player has and how each individual sticker looks. The creation of the stickers came from a desire to both reward players who play well and motivate everyone to play better at the same time. This was not unique to my school, as teams all the way up to the college level have used helmet stickers before. Once the stickers start to build up a decent amount, your helmet starts to really stand out. It just looks “cool,” as a lot of my teammates would say. Combine this with the implied meaning that every sticker was earned with a big play or game, and a helmet covered with stickers is a bona fide status symbol. The stickers themselves are the speaker, and each new one works together with the other to speak just a little bit louder than before. This is the beauty of the stickers, as the goal is not just to earn one, but to earn many; to stand out as the best; to have the most on the team. This is what all the players work hard to achieve, or at least try to do.
All this is communicated intuitively to the audience through the stickers without even an explanation. The intended audience is those in the Mount Pisgah Baseball community, which is made up of all those who support and cheer for us. The real audience is all those who watch us play with the stickers on, regardless of whether or not they want us to win. Regardless of which group is viewing them, the stickers are still “speaking.”
These stickers have become an important part of the team and a tradition everyone values. The number of stickers carries over each year, so players build them up throughout all four years there. By your senior year, you have your whole high school career on your head, and it almost gives you a sense of reverence every time you put on that helmet. This shows how the stickers themselves can even carry a kind of solemn emotion, even if that is not the emotion it is intended to convey. That speaks to the range of things they can communicate to different people at the same time.
The use of emotion to communicate a kind of rhetoric is known as pathos, and the helmet stickers communicate pathos incredibly effectively, both through the look and the past successes the stickers imply. First, it is emotional in some capacity for every player when he gets a sticker in the first place. It may be a player’s first or it may be an important milestone for a seasoned player, but it means something every time. Also, every sticker represents a clutch play or a great game. Everyone who sees the stickers can almost imagine the emotion of that moment forever ingrained in their helmet. Not only do the stickers communicate well using emotion, but the stickers also lend a player who has acquired many of them certain credibility as a quality player. This credibility that the stickers show is known as ethos. Ethos is when you use credibility or being an “expert” to spread a message or persuade someone.
Ethos can be an incredibly powerful rhetorical technique, as it seemingly appeals to a higher power. In this case, the higher power would be the coach, and each sticker is proof that in the coach’s eyes you did something good. Having many stickers communicates that in the coach’s and frankly everyone else’s eyes, you are a great player and often do something worthy of recognition. Each sticker earned also shows that for at least that game you earned your sticker, you contributed more than a large portion of the team. This ethos could also be used to intimidate the opposition. Take for instance a pitcher facing a hitter with a helmet covered in stickers. That pitcher may think twice about throwing his fastball and instead opt for an offspeed pitch. This also shows how a game is like a special rhetorical situation for the stickers. You can show off the stickers in action on the field and combine the ethos and pathos of the helmet with your good play on the field to communicate to the audience your skills as a player. The stickers can do all this with a simple logo.
The batting helmet stickers can effectively use ethos and pathos to show off one’s skills as a baseball player without even saying a word. The small stickers have ingrained themselves so much in the communal identity of Mount Pisgah Baseball that it’s hard to even imagine the team without them. The stickers became such influential speakers, not through a beautiful design or expensive material, but through the hard work and success that earned them in the first place.
Writer’s Reflection
Dear reader,
This essay took a while to fully come together. It was difficult to think of a topic at first, but I was set on my idea after I thought back to my high school baseball team and remembered the helmet stickers we used. After I had my idea, I went to work on an outline. The outline went well, as my familiarity with the topic left me with a lot of good ideas to use in my essay. Because of this familiarity, it was different from other essays, as I did not need to do as much research beforehand as I am used to. I also started with the body paragraphs first, as I was more confident in my outline of the body paragraphs and not so much in the introduction and conclusion. As I was writing, I decided to shift my focus from the outline, because I felt the outline focused too much on my personal experience with the stickers, instead of an impartial commentary on them. Therefore, I switched my focus from personal stories to more proper rhetorical analysis. I also tried to include all three rhetorical appeals, ethos, logos and pathos, but after I decided my logos argument was too weak, I pulled it out and decided to focus on ethos and pathos.
Once I finished the rough draft, I waited for my peer reviews. I was thankful for the peer review process, even though usually I do not find it that valuable to me. It helped having someone who did not know much about baseball read my paper. A few parts were confusing without background knowledge, and I went back and explained them better and reworded them too. This essay also changed how I thought about rhetoric. I used to think it was verbal only. This helped show me that you can still communicate effectively without words. In fact, I think having words on the stickers would actually detract from their message. This will help in life outside of school, as it opened my eyes to thinking differently about communication. Sometimes it is much better to show than to tell. Overall, even though the essay was challenging at times, I’m happy with how it turned out.