Blakely does a good job of establishing and reestablishing her ethos and the reader’s pathos throughout her article. She first establishes her ethos by introducing herself and her main topic, her son. She introduces herself as a single feminist mother, instead of just a single mother so the reader is introduced to, and can sometimes relate, to some of her views. She introduces her oldest son ‘Ryan’ as the high school senior who is on the schools wrestling team, and later informs the reader that he is a captain on the team, letting the reader know that he is one of the higher ranked teammates, who other lower classmen teammates look up to. She continually reestablishes her ethos by using different stories and examples relating to her son and their experiences as a mother and maturing son, which coincide with the pathos of the reader. The reader’s pathos is established through her introduction of herself as well. Some women can relate to being a single mother of children and some mothers can relate to being mothers to high school students who wrestle. All mothers can somehow relate to the article because like Blakely most mothers have the same nostalgic feeling she does about the youth of her son and come to the same realization when their own children grow and change into a strong and independent being.
I think you summarized how this article relates to the public really well! Along with the ethos/pathos, it also ties in with kairos. The article is definately written at a time when all women can relate to the nostalgia of their children growing up. Also, it kind of relates to us in a sense, as several of us are starting college for the first time. By the way, I love your blog layout! :)
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with all your points, because I wrote on the same essay and used a lot of the same points you did. I think the pathos and ethos she uses are the main reasons her essay is so easy to read and to relate to.
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