Thank You for Arguing: What Aristotle, Lincoln, and Homer Simpson Can Teach Us about the Art of Persuasion

by Jay Heinrichs

Book Overview

Thank You for Arguing is your master class in the art of persuasion, taught by professors ranging from Bart Simpson to Winston Churchill. The time-tested secrets the book discloses include Cicero's three-step strategy for moving an audience to action?as well as Honest Abe's Shameless Trick of lowering an audience's expectations by pretending to be unpolished. But it's also replete with contemporary techniques such as politicians' use of "code" language to appeal to specific groups and an eye-opening assortment of popular-culture dodges, including: The Eddie Haskell Ploy Eminem's Rules of Decorum The Belushi Paradigm Stalin's Timing Secret The Yoda Technique Whether you're an inveterate lover of language books or just want to win a lot more anger-free arguments on the page, at the podium, or over a beer, Thank You for Arguing is for you. Written by one of today's most popular online language mavens, it's warm, witty, erudite, and truly enlightening. It not only teaches you how to recognize a paralipsis and a chiasmus when you hear them, but also how to wield such handy and persuasive weapons the next time you really, really want to get your own way.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0307341445
• ISBN13: 9780307341440
• Release Date: February 2007
• Publisher: Three Rivers Press (CA)
• Length: 316 Pages
• Weight: 0.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.2" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Keys to advertising and political campaigns

The book not only shows how to argue, it also reveals the tricks behind advertising and political campaigns. Heinrichs walks us through the basic rhetorical principles, starting with "ethos, pathos and logos," or character, emotion and logic. Character is the most important, he says, because your audience is much more likely to accept your point if it likes and trusts you. He shows how to construct the image of a leader to suit any audience--useful for anyone who manages people, or wants to.

Great Word Book

The chapter on figures of speech is worth the price alone. They help you come up with snappy answers and intelligent things to say when you normally freeze up. And they've helped me write better. Some of the terms can be a mouthful, like paralipsis, anadiplosis and diazeugma, but there's a glossary in the back. Plus you don't actually have to know the words themselves, just the principles behind them.

Made me laugh

Heinrichs has a great sense of humor that made me learn his 100-plus "argument tools" almost without knowing it. When he described his own arguments with his wife and kids (and even his cat!), he made me laugh out loud. It's the most entertaining intellectual book I've read in years.

This is an important book

Don't let the humor and readable tone fool you. Heinrichs makes a great case for restoring some of the forgotten rhetorical principles behind the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. All the nation's founders had at least some training in rhetoric, he says. Our ignorance of it keeps us from restoring civility and sense to our national dialogue. This book should be required reading in high school and college.