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Rhetoric is the art of harnessing reason, emotions and authority, through language, with a view to persuade an audience and, by persuading, to convince this audience to act, to pass judgement or to identify with given values. The word derives from Greek (rhetorike), fem. (rhetorikós), "oratorical, skilled in speaking" and that from (rhetor), "orator"
In Greece, rhetoric originated in a school of pre-Socratic philosophers known as Sophists c.600 BC. It was later taught, in the Roman Empire, and during the Middle Ages, as one of the three original liberal arts or trivium (along with logic and grammar).
In Ancient and Medieval eras of European history, rhetoric concerned itself with persuasion in public and political settings such as assemblies and courts of law. As such, rhetoric is said to flourish in open and democratic societies with rights of free speech, free assembly, and political enfranchisement for some portion of the population. However, celebratory (or epideictic) rhetoric, alongside deliberative rhetoric, is just as important an element of tyrannical regimes or dogmatic (religious and otherwise) public entities that are not open to debate on an equal footing.
