Assume and explain that the author’s rhetorical choices worked on the target

Step 6: Draft a thesis statement for your own rhetorical analysis essay that states the main insight your
paper will offer about the comparative impact of the author’s choices on the original audience
and on you. Assume and explain that the author’s rhetorical choices worked on the target
Brockland-Nease ENGL 1101 Fall 2021 3
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audience. What significant similarities/differences between you and the target audience could
account for the text’s success or failure in persuading you to accept the author’s thesis?
Then compose a draft essay to meet the evaluation criteria listed below.
• Present an interesting and specific thesis as described above. Include a title for your
own essay that reflects the complexity and focus of your argument.
• Develop and support your argument about the text and its target audience through
descriiptive presentation and specific explanation of relevant evidence (i.e. quotations
and examples of the author’s rhetorical choices in the text AND information from
academically credible sources that supports your claims about the author, exigence,
and audience of the text). Each paragraph of your paper’s body should state, support
and explain the significance of ONE claim you’re making in support of your thesis.
• Support claims you make about yourself, as well. These texts exemplify the use of
personal anecdote to show experiences that have shaped an author’s viewpoints.
Include your own personal experiences to illustrate your similarity to or distinction from
the text’s target audience.
• Organize your support into a logical series of paragraphs that make your argument
clear to your reader, beginning with a relevant introduction and using transitions
between paragraphs and sections as well as return sentences to reinforce a sense of
coherence and order. End your paper with a conclusion that reinforces your thesis
without repeating the thesis statement in the same words.
• Include in-text citations and an appropriately formatted Works Cited page using MLA
guidelines for all sources you use, including the text you analyzed.
• Edit and proofread your essay to eliminate any distractions from your argument.