TCR 5060 - Week 1 Post - What is Rhetoric?

      In graduate school, I was told that rhetoric, as an academic field, is the study of language, communication, and meaning making. Countless definitions for rhetoric exist. Some of the following taken from the American Rhetoric website are among my favorite quotes defining rhetoric:

• Francis Bacon: The duty and office of rhetoric is to apply reason to imagination for the better moving of the will.
• George Campbell: "[Rhetoric] is that art or talent by which discourse is adapted to its end. The four ends of discourse are to enlighten the understanding, please the imagination, move the passion, and influence the will."
• I. A. Richards: Rhetoric is the study of misunderstandings and their remedies.
• Richard Weaver: Rhetoric is that "which creates an informed appetition for the good."
• Andrea Lunsford: "Rhetoric is the art, practice, and study of human communication."

(Accessed at: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/rhetoricdefinitions.htm). Of these, I find Weaver’s rendering to be important to the field as we often equip rhetoricians, but rarely raise the trumpet that pursuing what is “good” and “just” are equally important to persuading others to that end.

       While many trace the origins of “rhetoric” to Gorgias, Socrates and Plato, rhetoric has been in use since the beginning of persuasive communication. In fact, even animals might be considered rhetoricians, attempt to convince predators or members of their own kind of one thing or another through the use of communication, gestures, and behaviors. Socrates considered rhetoric to be quite course; its use by the sophists to convince for money was appalling to Plato’s rendering of Socrates. Aristotle, Plato’s student, took rhetoric in an entirely different direction, demonstrating that when used for the good, rhetoric is of great import to society, especially in the legislative arena.

       Primarily, I’m hoping to gain better and more artful skills for teaching in TCR in order to ultimately gain a position as a tenured professor.