Content-type: text/html Downes.ca ~ Stephen's Web ~ The Linguistics of Mass Persuasion Part 2: Choose Your Own Adventure

Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

It's always appropriate to restate these points: "In the realm of political persuasion, sophisticated language use can be very effective in swaying an audience. We are encouraged to 'choose' out of a limited set of choices, to fill in obvious information, to resolve the cliffhanger in an already fully-framed narrative—all without necessarily being aware of it. As we engage with politics, it's important to remember how powerful words can ultimately be, and how easily we can be persuaded by them." What's important is that it's not only in politics where word selection is used to sway or limit choices. Advertisers work with this all the time, and so do educators.

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Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
stephen@downes.ca

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Last Updated: Nov 21, 2024 7:18 p.m.

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