We focused on the purpose of rhetoric because of how fundamental our group believed purpose was in creating an understanding of rhetoric as it is situated within the university and as a concept. Our group wanted to generate a definition that was focused and succinct--something that explains not just what rhetoric is or does, but why rhetoric is important as a concept and as a discipline within the institution. In other words, we wanted a definition that would answer the question “what is rhetoric?” but also a definition that includes “why is rhetoric?” By tracing how Plato, Aristotle, and Foucault see the purpose of rhetoric, we are (to steal a metaphor) mapping out a series of waves--from where rhetoric was first fastened toward how rhetoric begins to ebb and flow with each perspective being distinct, but each existing with the preceding perspectives visible within each new perspective. We are not claiming that Plato, Aristotle, and Foucault represent three paradigm shifts in how each situates rhetoric with a purpose, but we are claiming that each scholar provides something different to how rhetoric should be seen as a concept and a scholarship.
In this blog post, we begin with Plato believing in an absolute Truth--the focus is on a rhetor who leads others toward this truth. Aristotle then begins to move toward making rhetoric situational, but laying the emphasis on persuasion. Using the Ancient Greeks as a starting point, we move to Foucault who discusses rhetoric through discourse--the construction, relation, and reification of reality and truth. Finally, with Plato, Aristotle, and Foucault briefly summarized, each group member generates their own definition that attempts to synthesize all perspectives we've read thus far--each group member synthesizes in different ways by taking what he or she believes works best and leaves out what he or she believes may not work.
PLATO
For Plato, rhetoric serves as a conduit that leads souls to absolute Truth. Rhetoric is transcendental since Truth lies in an inaccessible abstract realm and not the natural world. Accessibility to the Truth is limited to a privileged few. People cannot become rhetoricians simply by learning processes and correct diction. Instead, good rhetoricians must understand the truth of things and the nature of the souls of their audience members, and then must construct and arrange discourse accordingly (167). Thus, philosophical contemplation, and not observation, allows rhetoricians to get closer to the Truth. Dialectic and argumentation are important rhetorical tools for Plato, as he focuses on how viewpoints differ and then come together. Through reasoned arguments, rhetoricians will examine a subject and its differing viewpoints in order to arrive at an absolute Truth.
ARISTOTLE
According to Aristotle, “Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion” (181). The purpose of rhetoric is to use logic, emotion, and attention to audience to make the arguments that will be most persuasive for the intended audience in the situation that the rhetor is speaking. Rhetoric uses artistic and inartistic proofs in public speeches. Aristotle lays out three occasions for public speaking - political speech (deliberative), law court (forensic), and ceremonial. Rhetoric should rely mostly on logic, but also should be well-delivered in a clear style. The rhetor has to craft his (and it is a him who speaks) message.
MICHEL FOUCAULT
Unlike his forefathers, Foucault doesn’t explicitly mention rhetoric. Instead, Foucault deals in discourse and discursive formations. For Foucault, there is no pure essential being or reality. Rather, objects are formed through discourse as a result of the use of language. Discourse, however, is more than language - Foucault doesn’t look to the meaning of words, but to how the serve to create realities. In n this excerpt from Archaeology of Knowledge, Foucault demonstrates how “madness” is constructed by discursive practices rooted in the speaker’s authority, the place of the utterance, and the positions of the speaker, subject, and other material objects. Relationships are key to Foucault’s theories of discourse - these relationships allow for meaning to be made, but also allow for a certain level of ambiguity that allows for multiple possibilities of reality. These relationships are communicated in statements, a unit of discourse, not necessarily a sentence and not necessarily language, but crucial to the discursive formation of reality. The purpose of language is to form statements, although the two are not synonomous. In the excerpt from The Order of Discourse, Foucault demonstrates how discourse is shared and reified as truth, becoming a governing social construct as well as forming discursive objects. He questions the authority of text, the author, and the discursive truth. The purpose of discourse as Foucault defines it is the construct, relate, and reify reality and truth.
AMY
My definition of rhetoric has expanded this semester. Rhetoric looks at all the ways we use sign systems to communicate, including written language, oral language, gesture, visuals, and digital technology. Rhetoric includes persuasion, public speech, and private conversation. It is concerned with context, audience, logic, emotion, misunderstanding, and ambiguity. It can be used to bring people together, divide people, or fail to move an audience at all.
AIMEE
Rhetoric is an act of discourse which may attempt to persuade or motivate an audience. Since rhetoric is not only created by a speaker, but the audience and the contexts of the situation, rhetoric is also participatory. The effectiveness of rhetoric is really dependent on the audience's reception and interpretation of it. Rhetoric is ambiguous since it is made up of words, and absolute meaning is not inherent in words. Meaning making is a function of rhetoric, as meanings are reinvented and reinterpreted amongst participants and situations.
HEATHER
For me, rhetoric has taken many shapes this semester. So many, in fact, that I'm not sure that its possible to describe rhetoric in one definition. I see rhetoric as multifaceted and context-specific, which only makes it more difficult to define. Is rhetoric how we use it? Is the purpose of rhetoric it's defining factor? Does the audience shape the the rhetoric? There aren't clear answers to any of these questions. Recently Dr. Yancey called rhetoric constitutive - I think that's the definition I like best. Rhetoric creates and constitutes a certain reality for a given situation, rhetor, and audience. The effects of rhetoric are often local, but can be global, too, given proper recirculation and reification (see Foucault).
JOE
As the semester progressed, I expanded my definition of rhetoric beyond simply a means of persuasion. A Rhetoric--similar to what Burke and Foucault say--is a network of relations between knowledge, language, the self, others, and the environment. Rhetoric is the intersection of these things within the network. But the network is recursive--each portion contained in a scene affects the other portions. Rhetoric still includes persuasion, but with this definition, rhetoric has expanded toward how relationships among things are built or broken down.
In this blog post, we begin with Plato believing in an absolute Truth--the focus is on a rhetor who leads others toward this truth. Aristotle then begins to move toward making rhetoric situational, but laying the emphasis on persuasion. Using the Ancient Greeks as a starting point, we move to Foucault who discusses rhetoric through discourse--the construction, relation, and reification of reality and truth. Finally, with Plato, Aristotle, and Foucault briefly summarized, each group member generates their own definition that attempts to synthesize all perspectives we've read thus far--each group member synthesizes in different ways by taking what he or she believes works best and leaves out what he or she believes may not work.
PLATO
For Plato, rhetoric serves as a conduit that leads souls to absolute Truth. Rhetoric is transcendental since Truth lies in an inaccessible abstract realm and not the natural world. Accessibility to the Truth is limited to a privileged few. People cannot become rhetoricians simply by learning processes and correct diction. Instead, good rhetoricians must understand the truth of things and the nature of the souls of their audience members, and then must construct and arrange discourse accordingly (167). Thus, philosophical contemplation, and not observation, allows rhetoricians to get closer to the Truth. Dialectic and argumentation are important rhetorical tools for Plato, as he focuses on how viewpoints differ and then come together. Through reasoned arguments, rhetoricians will examine a subject and its differing viewpoints in order to arrive at an absolute Truth.
ARISTOTLE
According to Aristotle, “Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion” (181). The purpose of rhetoric is to use logic, emotion, and attention to audience to make the arguments that will be most persuasive for the intended audience in the situation that the rhetor is speaking. Rhetoric uses artistic and inartistic proofs in public speeches. Aristotle lays out three occasions for public speaking - political speech (deliberative), law court (forensic), and ceremonial. Rhetoric should rely mostly on logic, but also should be well-delivered in a clear style. The rhetor has to craft his (and it is a him who speaks) message.
MICHEL FOUCAULT
Unlike his forefathers, Foucault doesn’t explicitly mention rhetoric. Instead, Foucault deals in discourse and discursive formations. For Foucault, there is no pure essential being or reality. Rather, objects are formed through discourse as a result of the use of language. Discourse, however, is more than language - Foucault doesn’t look to the meaning of words, but to how the serve to create realities. In n this excerpt from Archaeology of Knowledge, Foucault demonstrates how “madness” is constructed by discursive practices rooted in the speaker’s authority, the place of the utterance, and the positions of the speaker, subject, and other material objects. Relationships are key to Foucault’s theories of discourse - these relationships allow for meaning to be made, but also allow for a certain level of ambiguity that allows for multiple possibilities of reality. These relationships are communicated in statements, a unit of discourse, not necessarily a sentence and not necessarily language, but crucial to the discursive formation of reality. The purpose of language is to form statements, although the two are not synonomous. In the excerpt from The Order of Discourse, Foucault demonstrates how discourse is shared and reified as truth, becoming a governing social construct as well as forming discursive objects. He questions the authority of text, the author, and the discursive truth. The purpose of discourse as Foucault defines it is the construct, relate, and reify reality and truth.
AMY
My definition of rhetoric has expanded this semester. Rhetoric looks at all the ways we use sign systems to communicate, including written language, oral language, gesture, visuals, and digital technology. Rhetoric includes persuasion, public speech, and private conversation. It is concerned with context, audience, logic, emotion, misunderstanding, and ambiguity. It can be used to bring people together, divide people, or fail to move an audience at all.
AIMEE
Rhetoric is an act of discourse which may attempt to persuade or motivate an audience. Since rhetoric is not only created by a speaker, but the audience and the contexts of the situation, rhetoric is also participatory. The effectiveness of rhetoric is really dependent on the audience's reception and interpretation of it. Rhetoric is ambiguous since it is made up of words, and absolute meaning is not inherent in words. Meaning making is a function of rhetoric, as meanings are reinvented and reinterpreted amongst participants and situations.
HEATHER
For me, rhetoric has taken many shapes this semester. So many, in fact, that I'm not sure that its possible to describe rhetoric in one definition. I see rhetoric as multifaceted and context-specific, which only makes it more difficult to define. Is rhetoric how we use it? Is the purpose of rhetoric it's defining factor? Does the audience shape the the rhetoric? There aren't clear answers to any of these questions. Recently Dr. Yancey called rhetoric constitutive - I think that's the definition I like best. Rhetoric creates and constitutes a certain reality for a given situation, rhetor, and audience. The effects of rhetoric are often local, but can be global, too, given proper recirculation and reification (see Foucault).
JOE
As the semester progressed, I expanded my definition of rhetoric beyond simply a means of persuasion. A Rhetoric--similar to what Burke and Foucault say--is a network of relations between knowledge, language, the self, others, and the environment. Rhetoric is the intersection of these things within the network. But the network is recursive--each portion contained in a scene affects the other portions. Rhetoric still includes persuasion, but with this definition, rhetoric has expanded toward how relationships among things are built or broken down.
No comments:
Post a Comment