Intro to Part One of the RT

The birth of rhetoric was tied to the development of social organizations and new forms of government. As city states began to expand to different areas, the development o trade caused the wealth o come individuals to increase. Because of the power that came with wealth, these individuals were able to buy support to become the next ruler, thus making the current way of government unstable. With all the governmental changes that were taking place, it was difficult to bring order to society , or to agree on a common way for things to be done. Oration was used in order to persuade an audience to conform to one thing or idea to to the next. I think it is very interesting how rhetoric as oration developed in a culture where hardly anyone was literate, and the only way to get a piece of information across on any given matter was through speech. We see tough this that rhetoric reflects whatever culture that it is immersed into. For example, in modern America we are very big on consuming products. The consumption of products is a result from the advertisements of these products. Advertising has everything to do with visual rhetoric. Visual rhetoric is a genre that did not exist during the time of oration, or during the time that oral rhetoric was being transitioned into its written form, because such visual advertisements were not a part of the culture during those times.