Shooting An Elephant Rhetorical Analysis

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Relationship between imperialists and the imperialized are bound to be difficult to understand, especially from a distance. In George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant”, he uses a variety of tones and sentence structure as well as other rhetorical strategies to prove that the victims of imperialism aren’t the people suffering; he is.
Orwell opens paragraph seven with a straightforward, almost detached tone, exactly what you would expect from an imperialist police officer going to perform his duty. He uses phrases like “glanced round”, “yellow” and “immense crowd” to make himself seem very much in control. Although he is in an important and potentially dangerous situation, his tone doesn’t reveal any feelings of panic or uncertainty. Instead, the lack of flowery or elaborate syntax leads the reader to imaging a professional young Orwell carrying out a job for his country. He also uses distinct and demeaning imagery like “the sea of yellow faces” and “above the garish clothes” to distinguish himself from the Burmese …show more content…
The once cool and in control demeanor of Orwell abruptly transitions to one of alarm and anxiety. He writes “the people expected it of me and I had got to do it”, further showing the reader, through his panicked tone, the feeling of despair that was rising up inside of him. It is here that Orwell begins to realize that, while he was “seemingly the leading actor” he was actually “only an absurd puppet”. These phrases fills the reader’s mind with the image of a puppet, controlled by its master, seeming to command the stage but utterly useless alone. The juxtaposition of these two metaphors allows the author to convince his audience that, while he seemed to be the traditional model of an imperialist, in reality he was being oppressed by his Burmese subjects instead of the other way

Shooting An Elephant Rhetorical Analysis

realized that I should have to shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got to do it; I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me forward, irresistibly” (4). The presumption that a ruler has absolute power over the people is proven as invalid once the ruler is dictated by the wills of the commonalty. Because of this shift in power, the speaker recognizes how a tyrant does not always have control over the masses. In “Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell reveals that imperialism…

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Shooting An Elephant Rhetorical Analysis

with the works of George Orwell and Henry David Thoreau. Their writings, (Shooting an Elephant and Civil Disobedience respectively), show this concept extremely well, as even though both pieces of literature focus around ethical decisions, one is unequivocally more poignant to their audience. The use of style is a big part of any form of writing, which is no different concerning the presented works. In Shooting an Elephant, George used a narrative style throughout on the account that it was a recollection…

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Shooting An Elephant Rhetorical Analysis

In George Orwells’ “Shooting an Elephant” he uses moralistic diction to convey a guilty tone towards shooting the elephant. He shows this when he says “his body did not even jerk when the shots hit him the tortured breathing continued without pause”(P12)he uses the word torched to show how the elephant was dying painfully, he instantly felt bad and made the wrong disingenuous. In paragraph 5 Orwell says “it was a bit of fun for them, as it would be to an English crowd;besides they winged…

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Shooting An Elephant Rhetorical Analysis Essay

A crowd begins to form and as each second passes it grows bigger and bigger. He stands with the older more intimidating boy over his shoulder. The crowd chants “Fight, fight, fight” and as more people assemble the louder the chant grows. The older boy whispers something into the smaller boys ear and he hesitantly moves forward throwing punches. With each punch the crowd gets more excited but the boy remains hesitant. He stands victories over the other boy but as the crowd applauses him and praises…

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Rhetorical Analysis Of Shooting An Elephant By George Orwell

George Orwell’s, “Shooting an Elephant” is a well written essay that clearly portrays Orwell’s attitude toward himself and his position in Burma. In the first two paragraphs specifically, George Orwell uses various forms and methods of writing strategies in an effort to achieve this. Diction, usage of irony, and the usage of qualifications are all techniques that Orwell included and designed in an effort to convey his feelings for himself and his position in Burma. George Orwell used diction to…

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Critical Essay

rely heavily on dialogue interspersed with clipped narrative reports offering little evaluation or interpretation. This style is prominent in some of his best-known stories, such as “The Killers,” “A Clean, WellLighted Place,” and “Hills Like White Elephants.”1 How surprising, then, that “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” has joined these others as one of his most anthologized stories, appearing, for example, in The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Longer, divided into several distinct sections, and…

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