Rhetorical Strategies
Excerpt: "Everything I had worked for, all my years of study, had been to purchase this one moment, in this one place."
Question: What rhetorical strategy is Westover using by emphasizing a single climactic moment?
Climax and repetition
Excerpt: “I had never heard of the Holocaust until I took my first college history class.”
Question: What type of evidence is this (personal anecdote, data, expert testimony, etc.), and why is it effective?
Type: Personal anecdote.
Explanation: It highlights the severe gaps in her early education and helps build empathy and credibility.
Excerpt: “I am not the child my father raised, but he is the father who raised her.”
Question: What is Westover’s purpose in acknowledging both her transformation and her roots?
To express the enduring complexity of identity and the inescapable influence of her upbringing.
Excerpt: “I had always believed in my father’s vision of the world. But I began to wonder if belief was a choice.”
Question: What argumentative element is shown in this internal conflict?
Element: Internal conflict as a method of inquiry.
Explanation: Highlights the tension between inherited beliefs and self-discovery.
Excerpt: "Curiosity is a luxury reserved for the financially secure."
Question: How does Westover use paradox to highlight her upbringing?
Paradox
Excerpt: Descriptions of injuries and untreated wounds from her father's scrapyard.
Question: What type of evidence does Westover use here, and how does it appeal to the reader?
Type: Descriptive anecdotal evidence.
Explanation: Vivid physical details evoke emotional responses and highlight the dangers of her upbringing.
Excerpt: “It’s not that I hadn’t learned about racism. I just hadn’t learned that it was bad.”
Question: What is the author’s purpose in including this reflection on her early ignorance?
To show the dangers of ideological isolation and how it shaped her moral development.
Excerpt: “Everything I’d once believed about right and wrong, truth and lies, had blurred.”
Question: How does this moment represent a counterclaim to her upbringing?
Element: Counterclaim.
Explanation: She questions the absolute morality she was taught, inviting readers to examine belief systems critically.
Excerpt: “My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute.”
Question: What rhetorical strategy does Westover use by personifying “voices,” and how does it serve her theme?
Imagery, Pathos
Excerpt: “The ACT prep book said I needed to know trigonometry. I didn’t even know algebra.”
Question: What kind of evidence does this reflect, and how does it highlight Westover’s educational journey?
Type: Personal experience.
Explanation: Demonstrates the steep learning curve she faced, making her academic achievements more impactful.
Excerpt: “There’s a sense in which I will always be in the sunlight of Idaho, watching my father forge steel.”
Question: How does this excerpt reflect Westover’s purpose of preserving complexity in her family relationships?
To illustrate the pain and affection she still holds for her family and home.
Excerpt: “What my father had written off as disobedience, my professors called curiosity.”
Question: Identify the argumentative shift and explain how it strengthens Westover’s claim.
Element: Rebuttal through contrast.
Explanation: She counters her father’s framing of her personality by contrasting it with academic validation.
Excerpt: “It’s strange how you give the people you love so much power over you.”
Question: Which rhetorical device is used here, and how does it build emotional appeal?
Aphorism, connecting readers to the emotional complexity of familial relationships.
Excerpt: “My brother had lit me on fire. It wasn’t the first time.”
Question: Identify the type of evidence and explain its purpose in shaping the reader’s emotional response.
Type: Anecdotal evidence.
Explanation: Creates a deep emotional reaction and illustrates the physical abuse and trauma she experienced.
Excerpt: “To admit uncertainty is to admit weakness, to powerlessness, and to believe in yourself despite both.”
Question: What purpose does this statement serve in Westover’s broader argument about education?
To challenge the reader to value intellectual humility and resilience as part of growth.
Excerpt: “The decision to educate myself had been a choice to leave.”
Question: What claim is Westover making, and how does she support it throughout the memoir?
Element: Claim.
Explanation: Her memoir argues that education is not only academic but existential—it reshaped her entire life.
Excerpt: “There’s a world out there, Tara. And it will look a lot different once Dad is no longer whispering in your ear.”
Question: How is metaphor employed in this excerpt to reinforce Westover’s internal conflict?
The “whispering” metaphor shows her father's manipulative influence and her struggle for independent thought.
Westover recalls reading the works of John Stuart Mill and realizing her own ignorance.
Question: What kind of evidence is this, and how does it establish ethos?
Type: Intellectual self-reflection and reference to authority.
Explanation: Shows her evolving worldview and reliance on philosophical texts, building ethos and academic credibility.
Excerpt: “You can love someone and still choose to say goodbye.”
Question: How does this line reflect Westover’s purpose in telling her story?
To convey the painful truth that personal growth sometimes requires painful separation from loved ones.
Excerpt: “Freedom is not the absence of limitations, but the ability to challenge them.”
Question: What argumentative strategy is Westover using here, and how does it reinforce her thesis?
Element: Redefinition of terms.
Explanation: She challenges common notions of freedom, arguing it comes from questioning, not blind acceptance.