In his descriptions of the early days of the Tuskegee Institute, Washington uses pathos to try to convince readers that physical labor and practical skills are just as important as book learning. The following passage shows his attempt to engage readers emotionally on the issue:
It was also interesting to note how many big books some of [the students] had studied, and how many high-sounding subjects some of them claimed to have mastered. […] In fact, one of the saddest things I saw during the month of travel which I have described was a young man, who had attended some high school, sitting down in a one-room cabin, with grease on his clothing, filth all around him, and weeds in the yard and garden, engaged in studying a French grammar.
Here Washington uses the persuasive writing technique of pathos by encouraging readers to associate book learning with the story of this unnamed young man who had “grease on his clothing, filth all around him, and weeds in the yard and garden” while studying French grammar.
By framing this as “one of the saddest things” he witnessed while preparing to open the Tuskegee Institute, Washington persuades readers to believe—like he does—that book learning must go hand-in-hand with more practical education, like cleaning and yardwork. This story sets readers up to join him in his mission to pair book learning with vocational education for the Black community.
In Washington’s Atlanta Exposition Address in Chapter 14, he uses pathos to make an emotional appeal to white listeners, as seen in the following passage:
You can be sure in the future, as in the past, that you and your families will be surrounded by the most patient, faithful, law-abiding, and unresentful people that the world has seen. As we have proved our loyalty to you in the past, in nursing your children, watching by the sick-bed of your mothers and fathers, and often following them with tear-dimmed eyes to their graves, so in the future, in our humble way, we shall stand by you with a devotion that no foreigner can approach, ready to lay down our lives, if need be, in defence of yours.
Here Washington encourages white Americans to support Black Americans via his use of pathos, a persuasive writing technique that engages people emotionally. This comes across in Washington’s decision to list all of the specific ways that Black Americans have historically supported white Americans, such as “nursing your children, watching by the sick-bed of your mothers and fathers, and often following them with tear-dimmed eyes to their graves.” Washington chooses the acts on this list intentionally—nursing, sitting by someone’s sick-bed, becoming teary-eyed, and dying are all incredibly vulnerable and human acts. He is hoping that white listeners similarly tap into their own vulnerability and humanity and remember that people across races are connected in a variety of intimate ways. And that, like them, Black people are human beings who experience love and loss like anyone else.
Rather than inciting Black audiences to rage (a form of pathos employed by some of Washington’s contemporaries), here Washington moves both Black and white audiences to understanding and care. This is related to his belief that racial progress should be gradual and smooth rather than rapid and aggressive.
