PRINCIPLES OF RHETORIC
SPRING 82
(Call me sentimental, but I even think parts of the syllabus are worth remembering here in this
record!)
OBJECTIVES: to acquaint the student with the legacy of classical rhetoric, the directions of
modern rhetorical theory, and the centrality of rhetoric in the liberal arts tradition that he may be
a discriminating consumer and an ethical, effective user and teacher of rhetoric.
UNIT I: the classical tradition
UNIT II: What is this thing? game? called “rhetoric”? A probe into the nature of rhetoric focusing
on the relationship between rhetoric, ethics, and dialectic.
UNIT III: Modern rhetorics: an exploration of contemporary macro-theorists.
(I was going to include the bibliography of articles we covered in that semester, but it’s probable
superfluous. It includes all the biggies of this field: Bryant, Bitzer, Wallace, Natanson, Booth,
Johnstone, Weaver, and Diggs. I simply marvel at the level of education in rhetoric I received
as an undergraduate!)
14 Jan 82
Classical Rhetoric was the cornerstone of the seven liberal arts. Rise of the Roman Empire ->
rhetoric became irrelevant.
Assumption:
Humans are social. No choice in that. We must live with our fellows. How shall we live with
our fellows is an open question, however. Not with ants, but with humans. Rhetoric is a
Western phenomenon.
Rhetoric doesn’t exist in Russia. Only in free states.
PERSUASION/COERCION DICHOTOMY
When you persuade the other person remains free. Rhetoric was at one time the core of our
culture. It recently took an act of Congress to declare rhetoric a humanity.
One definition of rhetoric: means of effective expression.
19 Jan 82
The question Plato is concernecd with, yea Greeks are concerned with, is:
How shall we live our lives?
classical thought vs. Modern
To Greeks, Truth really exists. The question, How shall we live our lives? To moderns, only
the empirical really exists.
A realist is one who believes that abstractions are real.
Gorgias claims to be rhetorician and , if you study under me, you’ll be virtuous.
The free man was concerned with the Greek question. That’s what liberal education is about.
OK, Rhetoric--is it an art or a knack?
Plato developed the Dialectic. Question and answer. How do you prove something wrong?
------------------->
Push it to the limit. If you find cortradiction, it must not be true.
Positivists pushed the notion of Determinism as far as it could go. Strict cause and effect.
A Greek thinker, Carneades, used this tool to test for the truth of Determinism:
1) Deliberation is undeniable
2) praise & blame “that was a good thing you did.” (We don’t say that to inanimate objects, only
people.”
3) persuasion we constantly try to get people to do things we want them to do. Only people,
not dogs or trees.
We cannot doubt any of these things. However, they are not consistent with determinism,
therefore, one must be false.
Determinism with respect to human action is not compatible with these three points. One is not
true.
Carneades didn’t even give an account of Freedom, he just pushes determinism to the point
that it contradicts what we cannot deny.
Polis--not “man is a political being”
“man must live with his fellows.” You cannot be virtuous by yourself.
Isocrates said 3 things necessary for an orator:
Natural ability
practice
training
suasor--Latin, “to make sweet.”
Virtue was a matter of Hexis, which is a matter of habit. Your habits tend toward the good.
Rhetoric is the central concept of how to behave in a free manner.
21 Jan 82
Platonic dialectic:
pushing things to the point of contradiction and reject the position containing the contradictions.
Rhetoric is the only means whereby free people regulate thier intercourse.
(see Johnstone article.)
Murphy--def. The systematic analysis of human discourse for the purpose of adducing useful
precepts for future discourse.
George Kennedy--distinguishes between primary and secondary rhetorics.
primary: the means whereby folks persuade eachother. In this sense, babies have rhetoric-they cry … loudly!!
secondary--comes about when society is interested enough to study how persuasion may be
taught. They come up with a secondary rhetoric in order to teach someone to increase their
persuasive ability. Secondary rhetoric is a Western phenomenon.
HISTORY OF RHETORIC
Homer (700 BC)
Logos--the thought plus its expression.
Humans are the only creatures who are capable of thought + expression.
Humanness is, therefore, important to understanding rhetoric.
LOGOS concept
Richard Weaver said St. Thomas Aquinas was the last of the Realists.
Occam-Nominalist view. Nominalists: abstract words are given meaning by human whim. We
can construct the world any way we want to. A matter of convenience.
The beginning of modernism began with nominalism. Francis Bacon espoused and expressed
nominalist thought. Problems of men solvalbe through science. Super-optimistic. perfectability
of man. Realist is pessimistic.
This approach is oppossed to the conept of Logos.
Greek idealParis--everything in its place and nothing to excess. idea of organic organization.
Drama was involved in evolution.
476 BC
Syracuse, Italy--Corax.
Sicily was taken over by some tyrants. Ultimately they were overthrown. Who owns the land
now? Who gets the goodies? They developed courts to determine who got the land. Corax
was very successful in hilping people get land. Why? He was teaching rhetoric.
His notion of probability.
Tisias--Corax’s student.
Gorgias--teacher who moved from town to town teaching. He was a sophist. A sophist teaches
eloquence, claimed to teach virtue.
Gorgias was responsible for: style = figures of thought
figures of speech
tropes
Protagoras--known as the “father of debate.”
He believed that there was no truth. “Man is the measure of all things.” “There are two sides to
every question.”
Hippias-- “Topics” Gk-”places” disciplined system of association.
Logographers--they were ghost writers. They’d write speeches for people to defend themselves
in court. Lysisas was one of these. He developed plain style: “extemporaneous.”
Isocrates, Against the Sophists. Known for contributions to education and culture. Drew
connection between culture and Rhetoric.
“How do you make a great orator?
1. Talent
2. Practice
3. Education (training)
Plato
Died 347 BC at about 81 years. He was homosexual. Socrates died when he was about 31.
Soc. died of drinking hemlock. Perverted the youth of Athens. Aristotle was opposed to
teaching philosophy/ethics/dialectic to the young.
Plato founded the Academy. It was in his house. 3 teachers and 50 students. The Academy
lasted clear into the reign of Constantine. Aristotle was in the Academy for 20 years. People
take it to mean that he was student of Plato. However, Aristotle’s works don’t reflect much of
Plato’s influence. Plato made 3 trips to Sicily. Began writing after age fifty.
Socratic Method --> “Eristic” Socrates got into trouble by teaching eristic to the youth of
Athens. Plato and Aristotle called Eristic “dialectic.” Begin with a thesis, one person upholds it.
One person asks questions trying to get the responder to arrive at a contradiction. When a
contradiction is arrived at, two conclusions: either the thesis is wrong or the person defending it
made an error. “Elenchus”- that point at which you arrive at a contradiction. Gorgias is
philosophic. Phaedrus is not. When eristic was taught as a game, there was a time limit. You
had to make your opponent arrive at a foolish statement in so many minutes.
GORGIAS
Came from Sicily and set up a school of sophistry. His approach was to emphasize style:
figures of speech
figures of action
tropes
Most of the time Plato is engaged in asking, “what is the Good?”
pg. 5- first clue as to what Plato believes rhetoric to be. Polus makes long speeches.
Rhetoric addresses masses. Look at the crowd, p. 75. Poets make use of Rhetoric in their
plays. Why is that a damning characteristic for Socrates?
p. 85-very important point. If he is wrong, you must refute him, if not, you must live by the
consequences. There is an audience listening in the whole time.
_____________________________________________________________
p. 25: SOUL
BODY
ARTS Politics gym
medicine
(aim at the
greatest good) Legislation
justice
FLATTERY
(aim at Sophistic Rhtoric make up cookery
pleasure)
(SEE pg. 90)
_____________________________________________________________
Concept of ART
to do something and know what will happen plus why it will happen. (ie, to be able to give a
theoretical account of it.)
empirical proccess--> “knack” comes “naturally” emphasis on performance.
theoretical proccess--> “art” learned, emphasis on teaching. eg, you might be able to play
basketball well, but that doesn’t make you a coach.
When you porceed empirically, the question is not “why?” you develop a knack with formulas.
the pervasive view of rhetoric is that it is an establisment whereby we change people’s minds.
Herbert Wichelns “The Literary Criticism of oratory”
process view:
Rhetoric as tool-->emphasis on effects.
The proper question is, “How do we achieve effects?” The process view has always been
around.
Make up aims at copying healthy look (gym) cookery aims at giving the body what it wants (as
opposed to needs as in medicine).
2 FEB 82
Copious--= “rattle on” Mark of a good rhetorician.
rhetor--one who practices.
rhetorician--one who studies.
Gorgias responsible for periodic sentence. Carefully balanced delivery. “high diction”
to many, rhetoric is the means whereby we add beauty to the discourse.
proper nourshment for the soul is truth.
Ergon--function, prupose, job. What we’re supposed to be.
Plato and Aristotle believed man to have an inborn ergon. This conept also applies to beauty.
Phaedrus, p. 19.
Important Greek concept--like unto like. Friendship. Plato said Athens is a vicious city.
Within a culture, the most central values are never questioned--when they come under question,
they are no longer centrally held.
Bitzer says-The rhetorical situation happens in relation to its exigence. Exigence is a sense of something
not being how it’s supposed to be. Something’s wrong here.” What meakes you try to
persuade another person?
3rd speech in Phaedrus concerns the nature of the Good.
There is an ideal good.
Things do not measure up.
Therefore, Rhetoric is necessary.
To Plato and Aristotle, there was an absolute Good.
Rhetoric grows out of a sense of exigence. Rhetoric is about influencing choice. It urges
action, gives advice.
Choice can be expressed:
“x is better than y” “Better” is a word of comparison. “With respect to what is x better?” Plato
calls these dialectical terms. They are inherently comparative. “above, below, better, worse …”
The criterial absolute is out of discourse. Therefore, x is better than y with respect to c. C is
absolute. Rhetoric is concerned primarily with c.
4 FEB 82
KINGDOM OF ENDS
Because humans are potentially free (members of the kingom of ends) it is not right to treat
them as objects. Therefore, good is to treat the other as a potentioal member of the kingdom of
ends.
Treat the other as an ends and not a means only.
SUBJECT / OBJECT distinction
|
|
actor
acted upon
to reduce someone to an object is to use them.
PARIS--everything in its place and nothing to excess.
Hamartia is missing the mark of paris.
9 FEB 82
Weaver’s conception of the arts of discourse:
Dialectic
|
Rhetoric | Poetic
|
P. 322 (Weaver on Phaedrus)
Congruence of Rhetoric with notion of the Soul. A study of Rhetoric is a study of souls. The
nature of man’s soul renders rhetoric an important study. Motion is part of the soul’s essence.
Non-lovers-->positivists
Positivists said there are three kinds of terms:
synthetic, analytic, meaningless
They believe that the real is the empirical.
They denote anything without empirical substance as meaningless.
Rhetoric cannot operate without dialectic. Dialectic can operate without rhetoric, but will do so
in violation of the human soul. In such a world as the positivists espouse, rhetoric doesn’t make
sense. Positivist is the non-lover.
Evil lover is self-lover. Exploitative love is always self-love. Evil lover treats others as objects.
Weaver--Cultural Role of Rhetoric
Dialectic / Rhetoric
Plato Aristotle
Dialectic is like science. They are concerned only with the truth with no sentiment.
Emotion / reason
Rhetoric Philosophy (dialectic)
historicity--actual (empirically apparent)
+
the interpretation (to make the event meaningful)
A simple narrative of actual events is not history. Events are meaningful. In other words there
is no perception without theory. There is nothing called “theory free data.” Proper historicity is a
matter of paris. Taking what is proper from the actual and the interpretative.
Feeling and emotion does not attach to the abstract, but to the concrete. We love that which is
concrete.
Aristotle’s “unmoved mover” very close to the conept of I AM. To know someone’s name is to
know them personally. They had no name for God.
Love is the power of movement. Change comes about through love. Apply to Rhetoric. The
aim of rhetoric is change.
ARISTOTLE (384-322 BC)
Born to the court physician of King of Macedonia. Went to the “Academy” at 18 and stayed
there for 20 years. Plato died at this time.
Aristotle’s school was called the Lyceum.
Style was called “peripetetics”--”walking around”
Two types of works from Aristotle:
Exoteric--non school members.
Esoteric--school members.
Why do people feel Plato and Aristotle are at such odds?
Because Werner Jaeger’s “genetic approach.” Classifies Ari’s works in three periods:
platonic
median
empirical
(Aporetic thinking: raises difficulties but does not try to solve them. “Noodling.”)
Greek question: “How shall we live?”
Aristotle’s question--”What is being?” or “What is substance?”
Parmenides--The Eleatic doctrine
If there was no material, we would have a vacuum. Matter occupies every space in the
universe. Therefore, the universe must be solid.
Implications--Universe is absolutely solid, movement is impossible. A lot of Aristotle’s doctrines
were to account for movement.
CAUSATION
1. Material--substance that something is made of.
2. Formal--shape of the thing; its “form”.
3. efficient--the goal that the creator has in mind for the thing. (ergon)
4. final cause--purpose for which it was created. (telos)
(All the causes are related and equal in essence.)
These notions of causation presuppose a creator.
The final cause of the human is eudaemonia--the good soul.
Without the concept of the universal and unchanging, thought is impossible.
1. Substrate--that which persists through change.
eg, sand-->glass, baby-->man
2. Privation--absence of a particular form.
3. Matter--the form which appears.
Form and matter both preexist but in relation to each other their previous existence was only
potential.
People who misinterpret Plato say he believed all that was real was form.
People who misinterpret Aristotle say he believed all that was real was matter.
If form is all that’s real, matter is to be despised. If both are real--nothing is to be despised. We
can feel affection for both.
2 March 82
some translations of Aristotle are quite bad.
Many people believe Aristotle’s definition of rhetoric as an amoral tool of persuasion. (can be
used for either good or bad) This is not true.
Relationship between rhetoric and dialectic. Antistrophe. Analogy.
Dialectic and rhetoric apply to all fields.
SCIENCE ART
Mimesis: a copy or An understanding grounded in
reflection of the truth. an educated principle. A learned
ability for “making” (creating) conjoined
with true meaning.
pragmatism--in order for something to be a difference it has to make a difference.
pragma--day to day practical application.
verse 5
the Neo-Aristotlean school of criticism headed by Wichelns was based on this verse of the
Rhetoric.
ENTECHNIC PISTEIS--Pistis: 1. state of mind or belief.
2. conviction--meaning
3. evidence which makes sense.
Entechnic pisteis is those things which can bring a person to a sense of conviction which
provides meaning.
CONTINGENT | POSITIVE
|
--based on trust. | --absolutely certain action
unique to humanity. |
by causation (no choice)
|
| --probability (educated guess)
|
Aristotle gave us the idea of action. Man’s function is perfect action. That includes a behavior
and a reason for that behavior.
behavior
action = reason-->motivation
rhetoric=-->action
Aristotle did not hold purely reasonable rhetoric as an ideal. Emotion is not bad. True meaning
has to do with the emotion of an action also. How could you understand what Charles Manson
did without experiencing the horror of Sharon Tate’s plea for her baby’s life.
p. 22 demonstration is scientific proof. Rhetorical proof is just as good, but different.
Necessarily bsed upon probabilities--we aren’t certain about many of the ideas we speak of.
The demonstration will not, in itself, produce action. You’ve got to have something in addition to
that. You must apply your demonstration to the audience, make it meaningful.
4 March 82
Bitzer’s distinction between 3 kinds of logical processes:
Scientific--apodeictic, (certain knowledge) predictable in terms of causation.
Dialectical--critique, criticism of presuppositions.
Rhetorical--probable, goal of persuasion.
The end of scientific logic---> knowledge
The end of dialectical logic--> critique
The end of rhetorical logic--> persuasion
(See Bitzer for function/construction of the enthymeme)
Scientific--the premises are laid out.
Dialectic--premises are asked for.
The nature of rhetoric--it is concerned with the enthymeme: the premises are supplied but not
asked for.
Syllogism:
Major premise In the rhetorical situation, the
Minor premise major premise is left out.
Conclusion
These assumed to be true premises are the things around which culture is built.
twpoi--places (implication is that there are places in your mind where you go to proce points)
very general ideas.
Weaver--God terms/devil terms (ultimate terms) are what topoi consist of.
twpoi=general topics
today’s most salient god terms: progress, science (and now--1990--”tolerance”)
That which is scientific is true, that which is progressive is good.
Aristotle’s definition of rhetoric: the faculty of observing in any given case the available means
of persuasion.
It is through these unexamined presuppositions that our culture exists.
Rhetoricians’s task is to seek out those ideas through which we can make an idea acceptable.
Aristotle presupposes an ultimate relationship between rhetoric and truth.
(Grimaldi: Rhetoric is Mimesis.)
False rhetoric fails in its function as mimesis. This refutes the common misconception that
Aristotle believed rhetoric was an amoral tool of the speaker. That is the sophistic definition of
rhetoric. That which is compelling (topoi) is another Aristotlean notion of rhetoric.
Surface rhetoric--the observable process.
Deep rhetoric--that which makes the language of the surface rhetoric meaningful. The
axiological commitments of the audience.
Rhetoric taps into a basic axiological commitment and applies it to a fact.
eg., Abortion
one side says a woman ought to have control over her body.
other side, a person ought not have the right to take another life.
learning rhetoric was, according to Aristotle and Plato, learning to speak the truth.
16 March 82
Rhetoric is not a value free concept.
In the Rhetoric, Aristotle says one branch of rhetoric is a counterpart of both dialectic and
ethics. Rhetoric has a relationship to both dialectic and ethics. Antisrophe=counterpart or offshoot. Analogy might be a better word. In other words, rhetoric is an offshoot of both dialectic
and ethics. Nature of the good=ethics and rhetoric.
Weaver’s two aspects to rhetoric:
Surface--> 1. Functional aspect. Rhetoric as tool; method.
Deep--> 2. Content. Rhetoric as idea; subject.
The classic idea--if it is worth studying, it is an art.
ART
KNACK
 is those things which can bring a person to a sense of conviction which
provides meaning.
CONTINGENT | POSITIVE
|
--based on trust. | --absolutely certain action