The first day of this course I was asked “what was rhetoric?” The next class period I was given an assignment to write a one page paper on what we thought our definition of rhetoric was. I sat down to try to think of something to type, and nothing. I thought to myself why I could not think of a simple definition of what rhetoric was and I am in a rhetoric class. Looking back at this assignment I can say that I did develop a solid definition of what I thought rhetoric was. Another thing that I can say from rereading this assignment, I really did not have a grasp on any real-life applications of rhetoric. I feel like reading the book is a good way to learn. I found it even more effective when I tried to put myself in the shoes of the philosophers and sophists linking their experiences and ideas to my everyday life and how it would affect me.