Rhetorical Analysis of Worldbuilding in Plato’s Republic
Assignment
Select a passage (~2–4 Stephanus pages) from Books 2, 4, 5, 6, or 7 of Plato’s Republic, as translated by G. M. A. Grube. You may not write about the allegory of “The Cave” in Book 7 (514–521). Summarize what happens in the passage in your own words, then conduct an analysis of the rhetorical strategies that the speakers employ to achieve a particular aim in that section of the dialogue. Make sure to provide specific textual evidence from the passage to support your argument. As you develop your ideas and claims, consider the following questions: How does the speaker craft their message to engage and persuade their interlocutor(s)? Does the speaker make appeals to ethos, logos, and pathos? If so, how and to what ends? If Plato employs an analogy, allegory, myth, or other figurative device in your passage, what conceptual work does that figure accomplish? How does this passage relate to Plato’s larger worldbuilding project in the dialogue, either in defining the way the world currently is or in articulating the way an idealized world might be?
Your final paper will be between 3–4 pages in length (no more than 5) and will be worth 40% of your writing grade. For the purposes of this assignment, you will treat Grube’s translation of Plato’s Republic as the primary source.
Learning Goals
- Make specific, clear, arguable claims
- Produce unified, cohesive body paragraphs that contain arguable topic sentences and well-selected, properly-integrated evidence from the primary source
- Adopt the appropriate stance, style, and genre conventions of rhetorical analysis attending to the author’s situation, purpose for writing, intended audience, and use of argumentation, persuasive appeals, and figurative devices
- Develop summarization, paraphrase, and quotation skills
- Practice process-oriented writing and learn flexible strategies for generating, revising, editing, and proofreading drafts while also reflecting on the process of writing itself
Required Reading
You must read the following to successfully navigate the writing process of this assignment:
Plato. Republic. Translated by G.M.A. Grube and revised by C.D.C. Reeve, Hackett Publishing, 1992, pp. 32–59, 94–121, 122–56, 157–85, 186–213.
Beauchamp, Tamara. “Ways to Think About Writing in Humanities Core.” Humanities Core Handbook: Worldbuilding 2023–2024, XanEdu, 2023, pp. 19–29.
Alexander, Jonathan. “Rhetorical Analysis.” Humanities Core Handbook: Worldbuilding 2023–2024, XanEdu, 2023, pp. 39–46.
Fogli, Giovanna. “Generating Claims and Structuring a Paragraph.” Humanities Core Handbook: Worldbuilding 2023–2024, XanEdu, 2023, pp. 60–75.
Connell, Christine and Tamara Beauchamp. “Integrating Evidence and Citing Sources.” Humanities Core Handbook: Worldbuilding 2023–2024, XanEdu, 2023, pp. 88–104.
