May 4th, 2008 — rhetoric
This semester, we’ve been talking about “theories of rhetoric,” even though many of our texts don’t explicitly mention rhetoric. Some of them are even hostile to rhetoric! So, then, what exactly IS rhetoric?
I’d like to offer some possible definitions. Do any of these seem to jive with what we’ve read this semester?
Kenneth Burke: “”Wherever there is persuasion, there is rhetoric, and wherever there is rhetoric, there is meaning.”
Bill Covino and David Joliffe:“Rhetoric is primarily a verbal, situationally contingent, epistemic art that is both philosophical and practical and gives rise to potentially active texts.”
Lloyd Bitzer: “In short, rhetoric is a mode of altering reality, not by the direct application of energy to objects, but by the creation of discourse which changes reality through the mediation of thought and action.”
C. H. Knoblauch: “…rhetoric is the process of using language to organize experience and communicate it to others. It is also the study of how people use language to organize and communicate experience. The word denotes…both distinctive human activity and the “science” concerned with understanding that activity.”
Krista Ratcliffe: “The study of rhetoric is the study of how we use language and how language uses us.”
Christine Farris: “What rhetoric has always addressed: not the mastery and regulation of language so much as the ways in which language shapes, reflects, and changes practices among members of particular communities.“
See also Stanley Fish’s recent NYT article “The All-Spin Zone” for another take on rhetoric.
Not all of these definitions cohere with one another. Why do you think that is?
How would you fit our readings into these definitions–at least some of them? What definitions do you prefer? Why?
February 17th, 2008 — Notes
Notes on Book 1 of “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding”
1. Locke’s goal is to figure out how certain our knowledge is: how can we measure the certainty of things we “know,” and how can we evaluate the correctness of our opinions?
2. Like the sophists, the question of knowledge and certainty in in play. Locke is no sophist, but he does say that there is a limit to our powers of understanding. Some thing are simply beyond the power human certainty. This marks an interesting parallel to what the sophists say about knowledge!
3. Some people think that we are born with ideas and knowledge inside of ourselves. Yet, Locke challenges this idea. Locke is convinced that we are born without any innate knowledge, and that we instead get all our ideas through experience.
4. Locke also questions whether there are universal moral (what he calls “practical”) principles. He says that there are not universal moral principles. It may seem like even thieves and villians recognize the universal principle of honoring contracts, but Locke says that their evil actions show that they have no innate principle operating inside them. If they did, their behavior would be different.
5. More importantly, Locke says that a “universal” moral principle would need no further reason to serve as proof. Yet, moral principles do require reasons. For example, it is not unreasonable (says Locke) for someone to ask why men should keep their promises. And when people do ask for a reason, they are likely to get a number of different answers, depending on who is doing the answering. A Christian will answer that God requires us to keep our promises, yet a Hobbes follower will respond by saying that public peace and legality requires us to keep our promises.
6. In another seeming parallel with some of our other (sophistic) figures, Locke says that a moral rule like “Children have a duty to obey their parents” cannot be understood as an innate law–i.e., a truth that we are born with. He says that “duty” must be understood as a man-made law, complete with punishment and reward.
7. However, this doesn’t make Locke a sophist! He says that while he denies innate laws/principles, he does not believe there are only man-made laws. Locke believes in laws of nature–outside of human creation or rhetoric–that are not necessarily implanted on our brains from birth. Locke believes we need to experience these laws of nature in order to truly say we “know” them.
In later sections of his “Essay” . . .
8. Because we only know through experience, we can only communicate to others by re-creating an experience as clearly as possible. Words stand for the signs of our ideas. Language in written communication should be neutral, clear, and unadorned.
9. Locke believes that knowledge is independent of language, but we can only communicate knowledge through language. Language is thus a medium of knoledge: a vehicle that carries it from one mind to another.
10. Here is where we will pick up with Nietzsche! Start to think about what is the alternative to thinking about language as a medium of knowledge . . .
January 21st, 2008 — Class info
To your right, you will notice links to our page for the course syllabus and reading schedule. Many of the readings for class will be found as links online or as PDFs available through ERES.
The “reading schedule” page will have links to readings, so be sure to visit this page early and often!
January 20th, 2008 — Books
Please choose a book from the following book list for your review. Sign up by clicking the “comment” link to this post. Simply write your name and the book you are choosing. Only two people may do the same book. First come, first served! (Example –> Jenny Edbauer Rice: Susan Miller, Trust in Texts)
You might want to do a little investigation about these books before you choose one. I recommend that you choose a book that relates to any personal, professional, or political interests you have. Some of these books are new and some are not so new. This might affect how much they cost and/or if our library has them. Don’t forget that you can request books through ILL, but it will take some time.
Book Choices
Cheryl Glenn, Unspoken: Rhetoric of Silence
Krista Ratcliffe, Rhetorical Listening: Identification, Gender, Whiteness
Linda Buchanan, The Fifth Canon and Antebellum Women Rhetors
John Schilb, Rhetorical Refusals: Defying Audiences’ Expectations
Susan Miller, Trust in Texts: A Different History of Rhetoric
E. Armstrong, A Ciceronian Sunburn: A Tudor Dialogue on Humanistic Rhetoric and Civic Poetics
Martha Watson, Lives of Their Own: Rhetorical Dimensions in Autobiographies of Women Activists
Kevin Michael DeLuca, Image Politics: The New Rhetoric of Environmental Activism
Roxanne Mountford, The Gendered Pulpit: Preaching in American Protestant Spaces.
Michael Berube, What’s Liberal About the Liberal Arts?: Classroom Politics and “Bias” in Higher Education