Am I Rhetorically Sensitive?

During my class this year we read an article called “Am I Rhetorically Sensitive” by Hart, Roderick P., and Don M. Burks. This article is simply a great article, in this article it talks about five different steps to being an effective communicator. As you have read in my previous blogs about how important communication can be. It is also very important when it comes to relationships wither it is with a friend, family, or significant other. Here is a brief summary with the five main stages from the article. I would recommend that whoever is reading this article that they take some time to check out the “Am I Rhetorically Sensitive” article.

The first step to being an effective communicator is to learn about rhetorical sensitivity. Many of us are the best at making our peacemaking through words such as persuading, negotiating, and inspiring to action. An excellent place to improve on ones effectiveness is through the form of communication. Rhetorical sensitivity basically means to clarify our purposes for communication and being aware of our intended audience and creating a language in order to reach your intended audience. According to Hart and Burks the rhetorically sensitive person tries to accept role-taking as part of the human condition, attempts to avoid stylized verbal behavior, is characteristically willing to undergo the strain of adaptation, seeks to distinguish between all information and information acceptable for communication, and tries to understand that an idea can be rendered in multi-form ways (Hart and Burk, 76).

The rhetorically sensitive person tries to accept role-taking as a part of the human condition. This pretty much saying what role do you exactly play in this world? The rhetorically sensitive person attempts to avoid stylized verbal behavior, which means they aren’t always acting in a consistent behavior around everyone. The rhetorically sensitive person is characteristically willing to undergo the strain of adaptation. This is how the world is so unpredictable and relates to how you adapt to different situations. Therefore you need to make the best of the situation and not try to please everyone because that’s too hard to accomplish.

The rhetorically sensitive person seeks to distinguish between all information acceptable for communication. Joseph Luft offers ten guidelines to facilitate decisions pertaining to self-disclosure. Yes, you can study and read scholarly articles on effective ways you communicate but it’s what your been raised to be is how you’re going to communicate.

Lastly the rhetorically sensitive person tries to understand that an idea can be rendered in multi-form ways. Your ability to adapt to the message that is being communicated to you. Maslow gives a great example on page 90 talking about coping and expressing but you can get a very good understanding when you insert “rhetorical activity” for coping to get the difference between expressing and creating rhetorical discourse.

Different communications have different purposes and different audiences. There are times where we have other audiences in mind, and have different purposes. When we engage other in communication, it is very important to think about who they are and consider the likely ways they will interpret our attempts to communicate. I think that one can be rhetorically sensitive but it is something that takes work and proper knowledge. We need to just adapt to the situation and fall back on our knowledge of who we are and what message we are to tell.

Hart, Roderick P., and Don M. Burks. "Rhetorical Sensitivity and Social Interaction." Speech Monographs 39.2 (1972): 75-91. Print.