5.1.10

Paper 2: Reading - Rhetorical Questions

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Rhetorical Questions

A rhetorical question is a question that isn't meant to be answered by the reader – you use your writing before the question and the context of the question to imply the answer you want.

How would you feel?

How would you feel?

  • How would you feel if your innocent, vulnerable little brother or sister was exposed to dangerous playground equipment?
    • In this phrase, the rhetorical question is combined with emotive language to steer the reader in the right direction.
    • By using adjectives such as ‘innocent’, ‘vulnerable’, ‘little’ and ‘dangerous’, we suggest that the young child is a victim who needs protecting.
    • We then use the question to encourage the reader to agree with us by directly addressing them (as ‘you’ and ‘your’).
Do you want to?

Do you want to?

  • Do you want to die young?
    • In this phrase, the rhetorical question is formed because most people would have the same answer to this question, and so it doesn’t need an answer – we would all assume that everyone would answer ‘no’ to this question.
Aren't you ashamed?

Aren't you ashamed?

  • Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?
    • In this phrase, the rhetorical question is formed because most people would have the same answer to this question, and so it doesn’t need an answer.
    • Because of the way this is phrased, the ‘correct’ response would be ‘yes’. By phrasing it in this way, we have implied that the reader/listener should be ashamed of themselves, and so should not have any other response to the question.
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Language Techniques

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Paper 1: Reading

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Paper 1: Writing

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Paper 2: Reading

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Paper 2: Writing

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