Persuasion

CAVEAT: No graduate credit will be awarded if COM4405 has been successfully completed.

UPON COMPLETION OF THE COURSE, THE STUDENT WILL BE COMPETENT IN:

• Comparing and contrasting persuasive theories.
• Describing the different kinds of fallacies.
• Identifying, describing, and analyzing fallacious arguments in the media.
• Writing credibility arguments to persuade an audience, improving interpersonal relationships.
• Hypothesizing how emotions can be used to influence audiences.
• Using logic to support a position on a controversial topic.
• Using information literacy skills to support credibility, emotional, and logic arguments.
• Discussing methods of audience analysis and adaptation.
• Analyzing and evaluating persuasive nonverbal behaviors.
• Examining persuasive messages and speeches in politics, in organizations, and business.
• Applying the theory of the stages of a social campaign to a movement that affects business.
• Discussing and analyzing the rhetoric of a campaign.
• Analyzing the process of manipulation—the unethical side of persuasion.
• Assessing the characteristics of unethical manipulators.
• Determining how a manipulator gains control over an audience.
• Applying information literacy skills to research unethical persuasion.
• Utilizing effective argumentation skills and techniques to persuade and influence an audience.
• Developing a personal code of ethics for the persuasion.