Every new high school graduate... free essay sample

Every new high school graduate is cursed with having to make the decision of what to do for the rest of their life. Many people choose to go to college, others choose to go straight into the workforce. For Elle Woods, her goal was to attend Harvard Law School. This became her goal after her boyfriend, Warner Huntington III, broke up with her because he felt that she was not good for him if he wanted to achieve his dreams of becoming Senator. Elle was a beautiful, blonde, sorority girl, and do not attend schools like Harvard according to many stereotypes. She decided that she was going to defy these odds and was going to prove everyone wrong by going to Harvard. During her graduation speech, Elle uses ethos, pathos, and logos to show her graduating class that as long as you have passion, you can accomplish anything. Her speech demonstrates the idea in our culture that you are not your stereotypes, you are what you make of yourself. We will write a custom essay sample on Every new high school graduate or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page When beginning her speech, Elle uses ethos to establish her credibility and to relate with her graduating class. She does this by using simple words such as our. Her first sentence of the speech is On our very first day at Harvard (McCullah and Smith), which presents the entire graduating class as equals. She establishes her credibility by reciting an Aristotle quote that her teacher had shared on her very first day of class. By reciting this quote from her first day of school, it shows that she had worked hard, and was a good student who payed very close attention in her classes. Quoting Aristotle also shows that Elle can be a serious person when she needs to be, and that further makes her a credible source to fellow Harvard graduate students. She also uses her own experiences to relate to her fellow students. Well, no offense to Aristotle, but in my three years at Harvard I have come to find that passion is a key ingredient to the study and practice of law and of life. (McCullah and Smith). By saying this, she shows her audience that her speech is from the heart and is genuine. Her use of ethos proves to her audience that she is more than just a pretty face, it proves that she also has a brain.Elles speech also contains many elements of pathos. Her main way of doing this is similar to how she incorporated ethos, with her word choices to unify the entire graduating class. Throughout the entire speech, she uses words such as our, and we to make the class feel as though they are one. She also ends her speech by saying Congratulations class of 2004 we did it! (McCullah and Smith). Elle also uses pathos to express feelings and emotions to her audience. She does this by saying It is with passion, courage of conviction, and strong sense of self that we take our next steps into the world, remembering that first impressions are not always correct. (McCullah and Smith). This sentence in itself can convey a lot of emotions in an audience. She is saying that you have to have passion for everything you do, whether that be school related, or even just life related. Not only do you need passion, but you also need courage. You cannot accomplish anything in life if you are afraid of the outcome or what someone else might say about it. Elle also says that you need a strong sense of self when moving on in your life. She makes this known that it is very important simply through her character. She always knew who she was and who she wanted to be, she never let anyone tell her any different. She was a strong person who stuck to her ideals and beliefs, and her speech tried to convey those same ideas to the entire graduating class. Using pathos in her speech further conveys her idea that you are not your stereotype, by showing her audience that she herself had defied hers. She connected with her graduating class on a personal level to get her point across.At the very beginning of her speech, Elle used logos. She did this by quoting Aristotle, who is a highly known and respected philosopher and scientist. Her audience was a large group of fellow law school graduates, quoting Aristotle is showing logic to them because of the fact that he was a philosopher and a scientist. Not only did she quote Aristotle, but she argued his claims. The law is reason free from passion. (Aristotle). She argued this by saying Well, no offense to Aristotle, but in my three years at Harvard I have come to find that passion is a key ingredient to the study and practice of law and of life. (McCullah and Smith). By saying that passion overrules your stereotypes, this is appealing to her audiences sense of rationality. Of course having passion means you can do anything in school or in life, it is logical to the human brain. Elle also says It is with passion, courage of conviction, and strong sense of self that we take our next steps into the world, remembering that first impressions are not always correct. (McCullah and Smith). Saying that first impressions are not always correct also appeals to the audiences rationality, because humans all know that you have to get to know a person before you can make a judgement about them. This was also logical for her to say simply because of her own experience at Harvard. She was judged for who she was and she proved everyone wrong. She accessed aspects of the human brain to prove that she was logical enough to be taken seriously. Even though this movie came out 14 years ago, Elles message is still very relevant to everyone today. Elle decided that she was not going to live up to her stereotype, and that she was going to challenge what everyone said about her. Elle worked extremely hard for what she wanted, and it all paid off in the end. The lesson of you are not your stereotype is still a very important lesson to teach today. There is very strong tension currently within our country and we unfortunately have very many issues with stereotypes. It is very important to teach todays youth and even adults that you are your own person and you can do whatever you put your mind to. It does not always have to be as extreme as going to Harvard to prove that you can do it, but the message itself is the same all around. If Elle had listened to everyone going against her, she would have never even attended Harvard or found what her true passion was. If Elle did not work hard for what she wanted and had passion every step of the way, she would have continued to live her life as the beautiful, blonde, sorority girl.