A Rhetorical Analysis Of Anti-Transcendentalism

Rhetoric is what can be known about a subject; it is engaged in speech or writing. Rhetoric is a technique of using language effectively and persuasively in spoken or written form. This technique can convince, please, or influence an audience. It achieves a particular emphasis or effect. Rhetoric is any communication used to change the perspectives of others.

Transcendentalism is a literary movement in the 1830s that suggest that every individual is capable discovering higher truth through intuition. Transcendentalist live by 5 tenets which are the importance of nature, self-reliance, simplicity, self-trust/confidence, and nonconformity. The movie Dead Poets Society is about a teacher who teaches his group of students how to live transcendental. The movie shows great acts of transcendentalism through each of the characters using the different tenets. Mr. Keating and Knox Overstreet in dead poets society shows that living transcentally is worth the consequences.

Jone Johnson Lewis believes transcendentalism to be, “Understood in one sense by their context -- by what they were rebelling against, what they saw as the current situation and therefore as what they were trying to be different from.” (1). This means that they see society, or a group of people, conforming to one belief and they want to completely change, or go against, the meaning of it. The only way it is shown is when there is a specific

Rhetoric is the study of how writers and speakers use words to influence an audience. There are many different pieces to rhetoric, like diction, syntax, and mood. Diction is the choice of words, syntax is the way the words are arranged,

Like before, a critical idea of transcendentalism is about the importance of being yourself. Basically, people should never act like other people because it’ll only hurt them in the process. Hence the quote or life lesson from Emerson, who lives by Transcendentalist beliefs, “Imitation is suicide.” By acting like someone else, you are only killing yourself because you will be making bad choices and decisions. Because of doing that, they’ll act like a different person and take actions that they normally wouldn’t do. Henry David Thoreau, who is another person who lives by Transcendentalism, believes that people should always be themself. He believes that people should never obey to laws that are unjust. If a law is created to make someone not act like themselves anymore, it is their duty to stand up for it

Transcendentalism Vs. Anti-Transcendentalism Transcendentalism, which emerged during the early 1800’s, was a revolutionary turn in American literature. Transcendentalism is an ideology that highlights man’s purpose and relationship with nature and the over-soul, or God. Anti-Transcendentalism objects this ideology and focusses on the flaws of man and his evil effect on society. Both Transcendentalism and Anti-Transcendentalism focus on the reason for man’s existence and his impact on society.

One core belief of Transcendentalism is that man is inherently good. The Bible, says clearly that man is not inherently good. “As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seek for God; all have turned aside, together they have become useless; there is none who does good there, is not even one’” (Romans 3:10-12).

Because American transcendentalism maybe visionary in its value, a lot of people who seek a higher learning would want to believe that they subscribe to transcendentalism. Since transcendentalism celebrates the divine equally of each soul, most of its proponents and followers, who were mainly from the Northeastern states of America, saw equal rights as a major concern in American society during this period. Naturally, they did not want to conform to the dictate of the leaders of the society, because during this period, the prevailing mindset in the Northeastern States was the struggle to abolish slavery and to improve on women’s rights

A basic premise of Transcendentalism is that individualism must outweigh the need to conform to society’s customs and traditions. Coming from a wealthy family, McCandless is expected to live in a nice house with lavish decorations and furniture. However, when McCandless’s room is described

What is rhetoric? Rhetoric is a technique of using language effectively and persuasively in spoken or written form. It is an art of debate, which considers and utilizes different strategies to persuade impact or satisfy an audience. It researches how language is used to organize and maintain social group, develop meaning and identity, organize behaviour, mediate control, create change, and create knowledge. Rhetoricians often assume that language is constitutive, closely connected to thought and integrated with social, cultural and economic practices.

Transcendentalists believed that people are inherently good and should follow what they believe in, even if their beliefs are different from “normal” beliefs. Transcendentalists stressed American ideas of optimism, freedom and self-reliance. They also like spiritual well-being and having a close relationship with nature. Transcendentalists dislike the commercial, financial side of American life.

Transcendentalists believed that society and social institutions, such as organized religion and political parties, were corrupting the purity of individuals. The guiding principle of transcendentalism is that people are best when they are self-reliant and independent. Emerson's literary

Transcendentalism is an American literary, political, and philosophical movement in the early nineteeth century that changed and shaped the literary works read today. Transcentialism is a longer complicated way to state a more “simple” idea. That all people have knowledge about themselves and the world that “transcends” the five senses, touch, sound, sight, and taste. It was a fight against the general state of intellectualism and spirituality that was prominent in the previous years. Transcendentialist believe the knowledge that everyone possesses comes through intuition and imagination instead of logic and reason. A major foundation is the belief that mankind is inherently good. They believed that large insinuations took away a persons individuality and therefore their own goodness. They believe that a person reaches their full potential and pureness when they are self-reliant. Therefore transcendtialist trust

Rhetoric is described as a way to pursuade someone to feel or think a certain way to benefit your beliefs whether they be true or not. Rhetorics are widely common in student essays, magazine articles and speeches. The good thing about rhetorics is that a person has the ability to voice their positioning on something, and tries to get others to open their mind to other possiblilties. The bad thing about rhetorics is that it’s an appeal to emotions, meaning it’s pursuasive, but not necisarily true.

Politics in the Transcendental era were often disregarded, the Transcendentalists believed that if one were to allow themselves to focus on the current politics, their path of