Lloyd F. Bitzer

This essay was fairly to grasp on the first glance at it. I had to google a lot of the terms to get an idea of what he meant by them. Once I understood it, though, it clicked to me. Rhetoric is using the English language to strength a point the writer is trying to make using specific word choice. It is almost an art of it's own now and if used effectively, can do a lot for the audience reading it.
The author of this paper states that rhetoric is based upon situation. A rhetorical essay is then used to bring attention to something. He used an example in the essay to explain this to me. When he speaks of the man who commits injurious actions, he says the man's actions are rhetorical. The exigence is what he says is used to bring attention to the man's actions. This makes for a rhetorical essay.
Rhetorical situations have three constituents: exigence, audience and constraints. Exigence is defined as any "imperfection marked by urgency." In a rhetorical exigence, something is brought to attention for a positive outcome. I liked to think of the debate on smoking in this situation and how it is a rhetorical exigence because it brings attention to a deadly substance and calls for positive attention to it. The second and most important part, to me, is the audience. A rhetorical situation is nothing without a target audience to influence. The paper is written in attempt to cause change in the situation so without the audience, the writer can do nothing with his words. The last is constraints which are the objects and events you use to build and strengthen your point. Many times it can be examples or your own beliefs.
He then later begins to discuss more important points of rhetorical situations like having a fitting audience and asking for the write audience. Without this, there will be no desired outcome. The importance of organization of the writing can also effect the outcome. He raps up by saying rhetoric exigences will always be here, will always be important to talk about and will always need persuasion out of. This is why rhetoric has to be important to us.