Dead Men's Path is a short story published in 1953, and written by the Nigerian Chinua Achebe.
Michael Obi's character is an educator who lives in a village in Nigeria and is in charge of changing the educational unprogressive practices of the school. He works together with the priest in town as both want to improve the living conditions.
One of the main aspects he wished to do was the abolition the superstitions which drove many of the events in the village, and to convert beliefs into statements supported by reason and science. Obi represents the contemporary culture, he is young and enthusiastic,he believes in progress and seeks a fair purpouse. But he finds at this point the opposition of the priest and the villagers. Everybody blindly believed in their traditional superstitious myths, rather than in the completely new ways of life preached by a stranger.
Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the capability of writers or speakers to inform, most likely to persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the European tradition.<span>Its best known definition comes from </span>Aristotle, who considers it a counterpart of both logic and politics, and calls it "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion<span>."</span>
