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Research Paper


“The Effectiveness of Persuasive Strategies in Protestant Evangelism Rhetoric with the Evolution of Popular Culture in the United States”


          Religion, primarily Protestant Christianity, has been a contributing force to popular culture since the creation of the United States. It has acted as a catalyst for change in popular culture with its justification of capitalism during the industrial revolution, and a hindrance in politics for its lack of acceptance towards diversity outside of traditional values. As the American population has changed, evangelical rhetoric has been forced to change along with it in attempts to continue to maintain a hold on America's evolving popular culture. Through time, the Protestant church has become a culture industry in and of itself through its development of various persuasive engagements such as fear appeals similar to advertising campaigns, its targeting of susceptible demographics, and its utilization of modern mass media.

          In order to establish the beginnings of this phenomena, we can refer to Quimby and Billigmeier's (1959) review of evangelical history. They sought to examine the altering of proselytizing styles within evangelical appeals during revivalistic preaching eras of American Protestant Evangelism through history, in its attempts to adhere to shifting changes in popular culture. The beginnings of the revivalistic techniques we know of today in the United States, can be found in the sermons conducted through the one hundred years prior to the industrial revolution. In these sermons, displays of public speaking by traveling ministers was thought to be motivated by inspiration from the holy spirit.  These credibility appeals acted as a major form of persuasion to the predominately impoverished and uneducated masses of the frontier lands. As the industrial revolution caused the further development of urban environments, in which middle and upper classes populated the city churches, the evangelical ministers assumed they needed to alter their preaching style to appeal to the new urban working class that was being ignored by the established churches. They found early on that because the working class did not find credibility in the established clergy, that the traditional high ethical appeal was just as persuasive to the working class of the city that it was to the farmers of the frontier. Evangelical ministers began proselytizing while using the common vernacular of the audience they could accumulate by addressing the social issues of the time that appealed to them, such as condemning the larger city churches for their wealth and opulence at the expense of their congregations. With the proper funding of the middle and upper classes, church leaders began to denounce such revivalistic preaching as only a temporarily persuasive evangelical strategy. Because these ministers did not adjust their public speaking style to fit the changing working class demographic that arose out of World War I and the Great Depression, church membership began a steady reduction in both financial receipts, and new converts until after World War II. It was not until after this point, that large scale evangelical missions began to greater appeal to the credibility of the speakers for people in general through new mass media technology. This became more effective than appeals to particular class demographics in the traditional convention style public forum.  This technique had become complicated due to the further splintering of evangelical denominations, and their differing opinions on evangelical approaches towards social issues (Quimby, and Billigmeier 217 -228)

          When progressing into the modern era after World War II with the increased presence television in American homes, Dickson (1985) began to inquire into the development of credibility among the newly created category of Christian televangelists, and their success for reaching new converts. She found in her initial assessment of viewing audiences, that they were predominately Baptists, elderly, women, non-whites, and Southerners. She also found that these groups, as well as groups outside of these, had reached a plateau in growth with no observable increases foreseen in the near future. Televangelist organizations had been fully aware of these statistics in their evolution, and began to develop techniques in attempts to increase their stagnant numbers. Many of these ministers had placed their desire for larger audience and greater revenue behind their need for increased credibility among a general public, rather than the primary demographic they had consistently appealed to. Dickson used the “700 Club” program on the CBN network as her case study. After conducting a content analysis, she reviewed the differences of the show format between 1979, 1981, and 1983. She found extreme differences between these years in such aspects as rapid commercialization through news style discussion of current events, the presentation of minorities in leadership positions, and drastic modifications in theology. These changes provide the notion that televangelism organizations continue to modify their evangelical styles of rhetoric in response to changes in popular culture, much like the revivalist ministers prior to the incorporation of the television (Dickson 1985).

          One of the primary techniques of American Evangelism from its basic foundations in the birth of the nation, all the way up to the modern era, is evangelists utilizing fear appeals to achieve converts. The fear of hell in Protestant evangelism has long been used as a way to frighten individuals into conversion through the often graphic depictions of hell. Jackson's (2007) report on the historical fluidity of this tactic, traces its beginnings in the eighteenth century with Jonathan Edwards. With Edward's traditional public speaking style evangelism, he traces this usage up to the twenty-first century with George Ratliff's modern use of documentary style persuasive rhetoric. He contends that not only are these persuasive appeals purely based on the same terror incorporated by the media and the government post-9/11, but also that the target demographic of these types of rhetoric is young children. Specifically, he begins by elaborating upon the technique of Jonathan Edwards. Evangelical ministers prior to Edwards used the basic tool of manipulating the masses into believing that disasters were the 'natural outcomes of declining commitment to God's covenant (44)'. Edwards marked the beginning of the shift in persuasive rhetoric from arguments through ignorance of natural disasters and loyalty to Biblical scripture, instead to a style aimed at the heart of the individuals listening. He would narrate for the masses the physical and psychological torments of hell through elaborating on the excruciating pain subjected to those damned through vivid metaphors, and promises of eternal isolation from God's mercy. As the Great Awakening ended, the Revolutionary War and Civil War preoccupied the United States for a period of time in which fear appeals were downplayed and replaced with divine redemption rather than divine damnation. This remained predominately true until the later half of the twentieth century, and even continuing today with the rise of Christian Hell Houses. In these Hell Houses, guests are escorted through a series of visually terrifying scenarios depicting sinners suffering in life before they receive their eternal suffering in the afterlife. Some such depictions in these rooms include a homosexual man dying of AIDS, a teenage girl committing suicide, or a woman enduring an abortion without anesthesia. At the end of their walk-through, the guests are offered the salvation of Jesus to save them from the eternal damnation promised to those they have seen, as well as the result of their own sins. Ratlliff's documentary acts as a mass media tool to bring the Hell House experience to the television screen of the everyday American. It acts as a rhetorical strategy symbolically identical to Edward's sermons of colonial America to bring the fear appeals of old, to the modern context desired of the ever changing popular culture of the modern age (Jackson 42-59).

          We can now shift to more contemporary research into the use of traditional style oratory of fear appeals in the context of today's college aged American youth. In Kaylor's (2009) findings of his research study examining student responses in campus newspapers to campus street preachers, he hoped to find how well their evangelical techniques worked through studying how students analyzed the ethics, credibility, and effectiveness of the street preachers on campuses. Campus preachers are known throughout the country for their confrontational evangelical style, which often follows a traditional script of condemning behaviors notoriously associated with the college age range demographic.  The preacher then threatens them with the promise of eternal damnation in hell for their sins. Some examples of the behaviors they preach against avidly is the promiscuity, drug use, and homosexuality often found on college campuses. Previous findings Kaylor referenced in his study found that the fear appeals used by campus preachers who use the threat of Hell to persuade students to abstain from such behaviors, were more often counterproductive by alienating the crowd and creating negative associations with the overall religion the preacher claimed to be a representative of. In light of these findings, he collected and analyzed 211 articles from American university newspapers over an eight year period from several dozen college campuses to evaluate the overall response to such campus preaching. He found that that students consistently condemned the speaking style as inappropriate and ineffective. This 'unethical' style of evangelism proved to fail in its persuasive appeals for college students, primarily due to the speakers lack of credibility brought from what they considered to be an inappropriate style of persuasion. However, the preachers often found the open criticism submitted by the students to be encouraging to the degree of being a sign of improvement based on their evangelical style. This research shows that both the revivalist public forum oration style, as well as the fear appeals based on the threat of hell, are both obsolete among college aged youth today (Kaylor 24-33).

          In conclusion, evangelical rhetoric styles have been modified through time to appeal to evolving economic class structures as a result of the industrial revolution. Following a changing economy, persuasive appeals for conversion to evangelical beliefs have transitioned through various techniques such as fear, terror, and credibility to meet the demand of the popular culture. As the demands of popular culture changed through age demographics, evangelical ministries have attempted to accommodate these changes through utilizing television campaigns and interactive strategies throughout the development of the American popular culture we live in today.

Works Cited

1.)  Dickson, Sandra H. "Television Evangelism: The Struggle for Credibility in CBN". FSC Journal.13.1 (1985): 1-15. Web.

2.)  Jackson, Brian. "Jonathan Edwards Goes to Hell (House): Fear Appeals in American Evangelism". Rhetoric Review. 26.1 (2007): 42-59. Web

3.)  Kaylor, Brian T. "Evangelism, Entertainment, or Education: Examining Student Responses to Campus Street Preachers". Texas Speech Communication Journal. 34. (2009): 24-33. Web.

4.)  Quimby, Rollin W., and Robert H. Billigmeier. "The Varying Role of Revivalistic Preaching in American Protestant Evangelism. "Communication Monographs. 26.3 (1959): 217-228. Web.