RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 1

Rhetorical Analysis

Career Mobility in a Corporate Hierarchy

By:

James E. Rosenbaum

Dariela Ramirez-Guzman

The University of Texas at El Paso

RWS1301

Dr.Vierra

October 12, 2018

RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 2

Abstract

It is said that a person has mobility when their socioeconomic situation changes in

relation to that of the home in which they were born. James E. Rosenbaum puts together a

research done by him, on how social mobility works on large corporations. The degree of social

mobility is a thermometer of equal opportunities that people have in a society to achieve success

and a good quality of life. Education has a major role in how a person's economic situation will

be. By having a high-level education, most of the people come out of the poverty that was lived

as a young person, or simply the economic state increases.

RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 3

Rhetorical Analysis

Career Mobility in a Corporate Hierarchy

The author James E. Rosenbaum implemented several types of analysis in his book, such

as Ethos, Pathos and Logo. The analysis of the literary text is an evaluation to determine, explain

and recognize the different aspects that make up a work in the field of literature. It would also be

specified in the author and his characters and what role or role they fulfill in the story.

Career Mobility in a Corporate Hierarchy is a book that talks about how education and

careers come together to grow economically. Social mobility or socio-economic mobility is the

set of movements or displacements made by individuals, families or social groups within a

socioeconomic system. According to Rosenbaum (1984), job structures have no impact on

earnings, and that the early earnings are inversely related to later attainment (Pg. 184). There

have been various studies that have shown how careers are structured by early social forces and

barriers is seen in the conflict between human capital theory in economics. Early jobs strongly

affect individual’s attributes, a finding which implies that the organization’s job assignments

cause a greater structuring of career attainments than human capital theory suggests. Career

mobility has a big role in a corporate hierarchy.

The genre of this book is informative to its audience. According to Vierra (2018), genre

is a set of books or movies characterized by similarities in form or styles. He gave us two

examples of books, which were anthology and monograph. The difference between these two

types of book is that the anthology has various arguments and on the other hand the monograph

only makes one argument. Another difference that these two have is that the anthology is

composed by different authors with the same claim. In monograph, there is a single claim an it is

usually in the introduction or in the preface. The scholar article stated that a genre is a term of

analysis in many of the disciplines which compromise discourse studies. (Ede, 1984)
RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 4

Discussion

Audience

The author is reaching an interdisciplinary approach to a broad audience. According to

Downs (2011). The awareness of this rhetoric led to the development of an art, that is, a

technique like instrument explicitly conceived for the construction of speeches oriented to try the

greater communicative effectiveness of them in relation to listeners, exerting influence in this

communicative instance. Such an instrument, because of its systematic nature, is a discipline,

teachable and learnable as a technique for the construction of speeches that everyone can take

advantage of their own qualities and the commitment put in their study and practice.

The book “Career Mobility in a Corporate Hierarchy, is intended for the Sociology and

Education students or professors. This book was published by the Academic Press (inside front

cover). The Academic Press has been a leading publisher of scientific books for more than 70

years.

Ethos

Ethos is a reference to convince the audience that what the author is saying is real

(Dlugan 2013). It is credible to the author. James E. Rosenbaum is a professor of Sociology,

Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University located in Evanston, Illinois (Inside

cover page). Rosenbaum has written five books in total his whole life. He is still teaching at the

University and plans to retire when he is 80; he is currently 74 years old. Career Mobility in a

Corporate Hierarchy was written by Rosenbaum and was published in the year 1984. This was

the first book he had ever written and was published. All his books are directed to a business

audience teaching how business relates to a social group and the importance of knowing how

corporates work and the cause and effect they might bring into social mobility. The preface

consists of how he had obtained the complete personnel records of a large corporation for over a
RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 5

13-year period, and what his research had shown was that this large corporation provides a rare

opportunity to study actual patterns of career mobility over a long period of time. (p. xv).

Pathos

Pathos appeals to the audience a sense of emotion, it evokes an emotion to the person.

Many of these emotions are feelings that the person has lived or have been around in a similar

situation (Dlugan 2013). The attributes of jobs and their changing effects on earnings and

promotions (pg. 97), was a chapter that was relatable. It talked about how working for a large

corporation could affect the way a worker is being paid. Their salary depends on how much this

corporation is making in the market. In a way I could relate to this because working for a

corporation is difficult. The job may consist of doing hard work, and as a worker you try to give

your best, so in the future there is an opportunity of growth and a higher pay. But that is not the

case with large corporations. There really isn’t any room for growth or higher pays; everything

depends on the market and how the market is doing. Another issue of large corporations is that

jobs could disappear at any time. (pg.106). Imagine trying to take your family on vacation but

you really can’t because you must live day by day saving money, just because your job may

disappear. That has happened to my family and me. It is the worst thing ever. Knowing that at

times there isn’t enough to go and buy groceries, depending on whether the market is going to be

at a high point and the income will raise certain days but then drop two days later because the

market went down.

Logos

Logos is the use of statistics, facts and logical arguments to persuade an audience.

(Dlugan 2013) According to Rosenbaum (1984), the study of a large corporation, is not a subject

of distortions of individual’s perceptions but it is able to view organizational careers. Inequality

raises a fundamental problem in society. Separating the poor from the rich and the rich from the
RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 6

middle class as well. The claim Rosenbaum is given readers, is supported by the research he did

for over a 13-year period. His research consisted of seeing what a large corporation does to

society, how the corporation works, and how they support their employees. (Pg. 316) The

research has been claimed to be on point. Need specific supporting details with page numbers.

Conclusion

While there are particularities in each nation, it is possible to identify factors that

influence the social mobility of people, such as their level of education, gender, degree of

urbanization and isolation of the communities where they live, as well as the education of

parents. To the extent that we achieve a better understanding of how these factors detonate or

hinder the progress of people in the socioeconomic structure, we can implement measures and

actions that allow us to build a society of opportunities for all. A more just and more human

society.
RETHORICAL ANALYSIS 7

References

Giltrow, J. (2009). Genres in the Internet . In D. Stein, Genres in the Internet (pp. 1-26).

Amsterdam : John Benjamins Publishing Company .

Ede, L., & Lunsford, A. (1984, pg.155-171). Audience addressed/audience invoked: The role of
audience in composition theory and pedagogy. College composition and communication, 35(2)

Boudon, R. (1974). Education, opportunity, and social inequality: Changing prospects in western
society.

Blau, P. M., & Duncan, O. D. (1967). The American occupational structure.

Lipset, S. M., & Bendix, R. (1991). Social mobility in industrial society. Transaction Publishers.

Selman, R. L. (1980). The growth of interpersonal understanding: Developmental and clinical

analyses (p. 343). New York: Academic Press.

Downs, D. (2011). Making Sense of Human Interaction and Meaning-Making. In D. Downs,

Writing about Writing (pp. 457-481). Boston: Bedford.
Race and Culture. (1950). In R. Redfield, Our Social Class (pp. 138-151). New York: The Free
Press.
Rosenbaum, J. E. (1984). Carrer Mobility in a Corperate Hierarchy. In The Enduring Effects of
Early Jobs and Earnings (pp. 175-200). Orlando: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers.
Dlugan, A. (2013). Ethos, pathos, logos: 3 pillars of public speaking. Six Minutes, 2.