Persuasion has been defined by Simons (2001) as the human communication designed to influence the autonomous judgments and actions of others. It attempts to influence and alter the way others think, feel or act. Although it is a form of influence similar to coercion and inducement, it differs from these two other forms in that it predisposes others but does not impose, affecting their sense of what is true or false and their evaluations of people or situations. Persuasion may or may not successfully influence one’s judgments or actions, but is still ultimately considered persuasion.
Sonesoon (2013), acknowledging the origin of rhetoric as the art of persuasion in Ancient Greece, proposes two traditions of rhetoric that are backed by long tradition. Firstly, it is the theory of argumentation and persuasion and secondly it is the taxonomy of rhetorical figures. Similarly, both interpretations agree that rhetoric is heavily reliant on the presuppositions shared between the initiator of the message and its recipients (Sonesson, 2013).
Sonesson (2013) mentions that rhetoric, just like semiotics and hermeneutics, is only a particular perspective on the situation of communication. Rhetoric in its classical form has four parts: Inventio, the art of compiling information, Dispositio, organizing information, Elocutio, expressing information and Actio, pronouncing the discourse, to which later, memoria, the technique of memorizing the discourse was added. On the other hand, the second form of rhetoric as the taxonomy of rhetorical figures, seeks to uncover “a set of general operations responsible for the functioning of these figures in verbal language”, so that it is applicable to fields other than verbal language for analysis, such as pictures (Sonesson, 2013). Rhetoric in itself is also said to have a communicative function, whereby one subject conveys meaning to another subject. Sonesson (2013, p. 13) proposes a communication model which shows that rhetoric takes the perspective of the message sender.
Sonesson (2013) then applies these concepts to three publicity campaigns: Absolut Vodka’s “European cities”, a Turkish car servicing advertisement and IKEA. To show Sonesson’s application of these concepts, I have selected Absolut Vodka’s campaign to exemplify his application of rhetorical figures. Sonesson (2013) proposed that “the most general procedure underlying all rhetorical figures could best be described as the production of meaning resulting from a divergence in relation to that which is expected”.
This is exemplified in his example of Absolut Athens, where he mentioned that “the bottle consists of parts of a Greek column, but in a different order and with different proportions than the parts have in the column”. As mentioned, rhetoric takes the perspective of the message sender and is heavily reliant on the presuppositions shared between the sender and receiver. In the case of Absolut Vodka, the company aims to create the image of an European product, therefore the campaign, attributing the shape of an Absolut Vodka bottle with elements unique to the European countries to create adherence on the receiver’s part.
The above print advertisement is for Heineken, a beer with its roots from Netherlands that has become one of the biggest beer companies globally. The poster applied the same principles of rhetorical figures as the Absolut Vodka campaign. It communicates the message that Heineken is a beer that everyone around the world can drink, not just a beer that is originated from The Netherlands. In the poster, it depicts the famous Eiffel Tower in Paris taken from the Trocadero Garden just adjacent to the tower, however all of the architecture has either been switched to the colour green which is symbolic to Heineken, or superimposed with crates or bottles of Heineken beer. The entire poster then creates a huge green landscape that seems to be seen at night, with green lights brightening up the skies of Paris. The slogan “for a fresher world” on the top right corner of the poster also seeks to prove that this Heineken campaign is trying to sell its beer to the entire world, and that despite its roots in Netherlands, such an image was created using the landscape of Paris, showing that it knows no geographical boundaries.
References:
Simons, H.W. (2001). The Study of Persuasion. In: H.W. Simons with J. Morreale & B.E. Gronbeck, Persuasion in Society (pp. 3-24), Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Sonesson, G. (2013). Two strands of rhetoric in advertising discourse. International Journal of Marketing Semiotics, 1(1), 6-24.