Analyzing the Speech for the Strategies of Ethos, Pathos, and Logos

Analyzing the Speech for the Strategies of Ethos, Pathos, and Logos
Speeches are part of people's routine life. They happen consciously in professional talks or unconsciously in routine conversations. In any case, a speech must appeal to the listener or the audience to achieve its intended purpose of convincing the audience. Ethos, logos, and pathos are three primary ways to judge a speech. Ethos speaks to the speaker's credibility and ethics, while logos speak to the speech's logic and reason. Lastly, pathos appeals to emotions and feelings. This piece discusses the success of a TED Talk by Rory Sutherland, an advertising guru. In his speech titled "Life lessons from an ad man," Sutherland extensively and strategically employs ethos, logos, and pathos to reach his audience.
Sutherland is an advertisement guru. This makes him qualified to talk about advertising, marketing, and values. Ethos appeals to a person's credibility, which earns him trust among the audiences who believe in his content without questioning. For example, Sutherland gives examples of how Frederick the Great of Prussia made Germans eat potatoes by portraying them as royal food (02:58). The example may sound unrealistic, but the audiences are convinced because Sutherland is an advertisement expert and must have researched enough. Therefore, his position as an advertisement guru makes him qualified to discuss marketing and advertising.
Sutherland also appeals to logos in his TED Talk. Logos appeals to reason and logic in the presentation of a speech. Traditionally, a speech has an introduction, the body, and a conclusion. Sutherland adheres to all these segmentations. First, he introduces his topic by giving examples about advertising to jog the audience's minds. He enters the body of the speech by telling the audience that he is leaving jokes and entering a serious and objective section. In the body section, Sutherland explains his points using several examples, which make the points credible and understandable. The body of the speech takes up most of the time allocated for the talk, while the introduction and the conclusion take up a little time. The conclusion only summarizes the speech's main points and makes a call to action by advising the audience to choose carefully what they place value on.
Sutherland also cites other research in his speech, further appealing to reason and logic. Citing other studies enforces trust in the audience, making them believe the content. In the speech, Sutherland says, "B.J. Fogg, at the Universi...