Insofar as rhetorical practice travels through systems of symbolicity, so-called channels or modes of communication are the discursive spaces within which rhetoric operates. And insofar as rhetorical practice should culminate in some sort of adjustment or change in audients’, readers’, or viewers’ knowledges, feelings, self-identities, and/or behaviors, the ways in which those dimensions of individuals
Interactions between rhetoric and philosophy have always been marked by concerns (and sometimes controversy) about the scope, status, and interdependence of the two disciplines. The reason is that while both disciplines are concerned with discourse, their aims are different. Philosophy is chiefly concerned with discourse as a medium to express and test knowledge, whereas rhetoric
Any understanding of the relation between rhetoric and poetics will depend on how each category is conceived. The term “rhetoric” can mean “rhetorical discourse”; or the suasory practices observable in any given piece or kind of discourse; or the art or theory of rhetorical performance. Further, “rhetorical discourse” may be defined narrowly or broadly –
The study of rhetoric and politics examines the role of persuasion in the political process. The study of rhetoric most commonly begins with readings from ancient Greece and Aristotle’s handbook, On rhetoric. Classical scholars conceived of rhetoric as a practical art involving the performance of public oratory in the contexts of politics, law, and ceremonial
Postmodern rhetoric is a set of discursive and critical practices that diverge from persuasion by means of ethos, pathos, and logos. Where classical rhetoric addresses a known and identifiable audience, postmodern rhetoric puts into question the identities of the speaker, the audience, and the messages that pass between them, interrupting and displacing senders, receivers, and
Pre-Socratic rhetoric is an overarching concept that captures not only the traits of Hellenic rhetoric that were demonstrated by the sophists who immediately preceded Socrates, but also the antecedent forces that shaped sophistic views on thought and its relationship to expression. The dialogues of Plato and the development of the Socratic movement have often been
This article examines the fields of rhetoric and psychology, each from the perspective of the other, and both from the meta-perspective of a psychologist-turned-rhetorician who retains equal measures of respect (and disrespect) for both. Rhetoric and psychology each study persuasion but from radically different approaches that reflect their contrasting origins in the humanistic and scientific
One of the most persistent problems of persuasion in the modern era has been the domination and subordination of racial “others,” yet race has received little attention from rhetoricians until relatively recently. Not until the second half of the twentieth century were sustained explorations of race and racism pursued by rhetorical scholars in either Speech
The conjoining of the terms “rhetoric” and “history” suggests at least three related but distinct areas of study. One, the history of rhetoric, focuses on rhetorical theory and practice during particular periods of time; entries on various aspects of this area abound. Two others are the focus here: rhetorical processes in history and the rhetoric
“Language is itself the collective art of expression, a summary of thousands upon thousands of individual intuitions” (Sapir 1921, 246). When exploring rhetoric in relation to language we usually have in mind the nature and functions of the communication systems used by humans in different times and in different parts of the world. Some of