pathos, ethos, logos

In the fourth century B.C., the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle posited three modes of persuasion that we still employ. Aristotle’s “rhetorical triangle” is ethos, pathos, and logos. It appears in many forms of persuasion - from political speeches to advertising.

We use the word "pathos" when referring to something (experience, art) that evokes compassion, pity, or perhaps a kind of sympathetic pity. It comes from the Greek word páthos meaning "experience, misfortune, emotion, condition.” Related words include empathy (the ability to share someone else’s feelings) pathetic (which can be an insult but in its original usage was more about things that move us to pity), sympathy and apathy (when feelings are absent). 

In the persuasive ad market, pathos can be a positive emotion (Look how happy this family is using our product!) to a negative response (Are you in pain? Try our product for relief). Have you seen commercials to donate to help children with life-threatening diseases or to save abandoned pets? Pathos. 

The ethos approach is used to convince an audience by offering reliability, honesty, and credibility. In advertising, this usually means a respected authority figure or celebrity giving a product or brand a testimonial or endorsement. That is why many doctors or doctor-like figures are used to endorse health products.

The word comes from Latin and earlier from Greek ēthos "nature, disposition’, customs." That last meaning may seem off, but ethos can also mean the characteristic spirit of a culture, era, or community, as in "the liberal ethos of the 1960s has been lost."

Logos appeals to logic and reason by using statistics, facts, figures and scientific reasoning. Aristotle liked the rationality of this approach. 

But the Gospel of John identifies the Christian Logos, through which all things are made, as divine (theos), and identifies Jesus Christ as the incarnate Logos - though there is none of the facts, figures or science in that early use of the term.

Logos also comes from Ancient Greek meaning literally ''I say.'' The word is frequently translated as some variation of logic or reasoning. Originally, it referred to the actual content of a speech and how it was organized. 

Logos should not be confused with logo, which is most commonly used to describe a symbol or other design adopted by an organization to identify itself. That word is an abbreviation of logogram or logotype and appeared in English in the 1930s. There is also the computer language LOGO written in all caps.

shrinkflation

Last year, I noticed General Mills' family-sized boxes of cereal went down from 19.3 ounces to 18.1 ounces. Hardly noticeable to most people but it means that the unit cost per ounce of the product has increased, but the average price remained about the same and it looks pretty much the same to consumers.

In 2003, I noticed that my Dannon yogurt was "cheaper" than other brands and then I realized that the containers shrank from 8 ounces to 6 ounces. These are examples of shrinkflation.

The news is full of stories lately about inflation, but shrinkflation is done to maintain a product’s price by shrinking its size or contents. A soda "quart" shrinks to 25.7 ounces. Who is counting that the candy bag that had 30 pieces now only has 26?

It's all about economics. Shrinkflation (AKA the grocery shrink ray, deflation or package downsizing) is not only shrinking products in size or quantity but even reformulating or reducing quality while usually maintaining prices.

In 2010, Kraft reduced its 200g Toblerone bar to 170g by putting larger gaps between the peaks

Some coffees that were sold in 1lb (453.6g) bags shrank to 400g or smaller in the 1980s. It helps that Americans never have figured out the metric system so the grams measurement didn't register. Tetley tea bags started being sold in boxes of 88 instead of 100.

In candyland, Nestlé reduced its After Eight Mint Chocolate Thins box from 200g to 170g and the Cadbury's Crunchie was sold in packs of three instead of four.

This year Procter & Gamble reduced the number of double-ply sheets per roll from 264 to 244 sheets in the 18-count mega package. What does that add up to? It's approximately a roll and a half less in that mega-package.

This post originally appeared on my Weekends in Paradelle blog

junket

The word "junket" was Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day recently and it is an interesting origin story. I associate the word with two things:. Now, I think of it as a promotional trip paid for by someone else (such as a press junket for a film by actors). As a child, I thought of it only as a dessert that my mother used to make. 

Junket goes back a long way. A long time ago a basket made of rushes (marsh plants used in weaving and basketwork) comes from the Latin word for "rush" which is juncus. It was used in English as a borrowed word in several forms finally becoming "junket." The word was used in English to name not just the plant and the baskets made from the plant, but also a type of cream cheese made in rush baskets. 

Going back to the 15th century, you can find the word associated with desserts ranging from curds and cream to sweet confections including the one my mom made that is still available.  

By the 16th century, junket had come to mean "banquet" or "feast" as well. 

Perhaps, some of those junket events came to include the journey to them and so the word broadened its usage to apply to pleasure outings or trips, whether or not the food was a part of it.