Mcgonigal's Rhetorical Analysis

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McGonigal builds up her explanations more sufficiently by using logos appeal again when she talks about vicarious pride. In doing so, she provides readers with reliable data and diverse information. Firstly, she suggests her points that “It’s no surprise that mentoring our friends and family in gameplay makes us happy and brings us closer together” (McGonigal 87). Then, she refers to Paul Ekman, a pioneering emotions researcher and an expert on the phenomenon of naches. Ekman explains that “this particular emotion is also likely an evolved mechanism, designed to enhance group survival” (McGonigal 87). Later, she mentions another expert, Martin Seligman who is an American psychologist. It is significant to mention various experts because it …show more content…

She describes prosocial emotions practically by using great methods, happy embarrassment and vicarious pride. To explain each emotion, she organizes structure well to provide the map of her thoughts to readers. Also, this clear structure helps McGonigal’s text flow smoothly so that readers could follow her points easily. When readers look for certain concepts from her passage, they could easily find them because of her organized structure. Not only clear structure, she brings many different experts’ quotations to prove her arguments as logical information. This helps to build credibility with readers. Lastly, she provides different kinds of game examples which are related to her concepts to ensure readers to fully understand. As McGonigal provides popular or easy examples, readers could accept her points and have strong desires to play the games that she mentions later. After playing games, readers understand how prosocial emotions work in their real lives and agree with her points finally. These examples provide direct experience to readers. Also, various comments from real gamers offer indirect experience to readers to receive different perspectives. Overall, McGonigal, through effective and various rhetorical strategies, does a good job on conveying her thoughts to persuade

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