The art of thinking · Language and meaning
Rhetorical situation
Also known as: Rhetorical situation (Lloyd Bitzer), Exigence
German: rhetorische Situation
In rhetoric, the rhetorical situation is Lloyd F. Bitzer’s term for the context that calls for discourse: an exigence (a problem that communication can help resolve), an audience able to act on it, and the constraints that shape what can be said.
- Thinking models
- Rhetoric
In one sentence
Bitzer’s rhetorical situation: an exigence that discourse can address, an audience able to act, and the constraints on what can be said.
Example
A recall notice answers an exigence (a defect), addresses those who can act (operators, service partners) and works under constraints (legal wording, the channel, what is known so far). Each changes the text.
How it applies
- Three elements: The exigence is an imperfection marked by urgency that discourse can change; the audience consists of those who can be influenced and can act; constraints are persons, events, beliefs, documents and rules that limit and enable the response.
- Fitting response: Bitzer argued that a situation invites a fitting response — the situation comes first, the discourse answers it.
- Debate: Richard Vatz (“The Myth of the Rhetorical Situation”, 1973) replied that rhetors create situations by choosing what to make salient; Barbara Biesecker and others later complicated both views. Technical communication usually takes the practical middle: situations are given, but framing them is part of the writer’s work.
- Technical documentation: Each deliverable answers a situation: a quick guide answers an exigence at the machine, a safety chapter a different one. Asking what the exigence is, who can act and what constrains the text is a first step of publication planning.
Rhetorical situation vs. target audience analysis
Audience analysis describes the readers; the rhetorical situation adds why they need the text now and what limits the answer. A document can fit its audience and still miss its situation.
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