Showing papers in "Quarterly Journal of Speech in 1992"
TL;DR: In this article, the authors reviewed DOMINATION and the ARTS OF RESISTANCE: HIDDEN TRANSCRIPTS by James C. Scott and Smadar Lavie.
Abstract: Books reviewed DOMINATION AND THE ARTS OF RESISTANCE: HIDDEN TRANSCRIPTS. By James C. Scott. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990; pp. 251. $29.95. THE POETICS OF MILITARY OCCUPATION: MZEINA ALLEGORIES OF IDENTITY UNDER ISRAELI AND EGYPTIAN RULE. By Smadar Lavie. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1990; pp. 398. $30.00. POWER AND PERFORMANCE: ETHNOGRAPHIC EXPLORATIONS THROUGH PROVERBIAL WISDOM AND THEATER IN SHABA, ZAIRE. By Johannes Fabian: Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990; pp. 314. $49.50; paper 19.95.
181 citations
80 citations
TL;DR: The authors examined the intersection between speech and the collective behavior of the audience in the 1988 U.S. presidential debates and found that disaffiliative laughter occurred when candidates were talking about themselves, most commonly when a candidate was responding inadequately to criticism voiced earlier, and booing occurred only when a criticism could be regarded as somehow improper or when others had begun to respond favorably to it.
Abstract: This paper examines the intersection between speech and the collective behavior of the audience in the 1988 U.S. presidential debates. More specifically, it concerns those audience responses which were unfavorable or disaffiliative in character: booing and disaffiliative laughter. Each response type occurred regularly in a delimited range of speech environments. Booing was restricted to environments in which a candidate was derisively criticizing the opposition; specifically, booing occurred only when a criticism could be regarded as somehow improper or when others had begun to respond favorably to it. Disaffiliative laughter occurred when the candidates were talking about themselves, most commonly when a candidate was responding inadequately to criticism voiced earlier. Various rhetorical maneuvers were thus differentially vulnerable to specific forms of audience disaffiliation.
79 citations
TL;DR: The role of decorousness in contemporary politics is illustrated by the extreme case of the courtly style, which constitutes power through propriety, is centered on the king's body, displaces speech with gesture, and ends in political paralysis.
Abstract: If politics is an art, then matters of style must be crucial to its practice. This essay considers how political actions are shaped by rhetorical practices that depend upon aesthetic perceptions. Modern assumptions of artistic autonomy are replaced by the classical concept of decorum, which offers a model for understanding how political life is styled for rhetorical effect. The role of decorousness in contemporary politics is illustrated by the extreme case of the courtly style, which constitutes power through propriety, is centered on the king's body, displaces speech with gesture, and ends in political paralysis.
58 citations
TL;DR: This article found that the New Testament rhetoric of belief is a form of epideictic rhetoric, originally thought of as a type of impromptu speaking, which is an alternative to epistemic or doxastic rhetoric.
Abstract: New Testament rhetoric, especially proclamation, has more in common with Sophistic rhetoric than with the philosophical rhetorics of Plato and Aristotle. It can be characterized as kairotic rhetoric. Analysis of Gorgias’ Helen suggests three types of kairos: a moment of poetic creation, a stasis of indecision, and a release of irrational power in the form of logos. Similar meanings of kairos as times of inspiration can be discovered in the New Testament. The Sophistic and Christian concepts of kairos taken together suggest that the rhetoric of belief is a form of epideictic rhetoric, originally thought of as a type of impromptu speaking. Epistemologically different than epistemic or doxastic rhetoric, this form of rhetoric, aletheiac, is an alternative to both.
53 citations
TL;DR: The authors Transcending the sub-stance of Dramatism, post-burke, and post-Burke's work, is a good starting point for this paper. Quarterly Journal of Speech: Vol. 78, No. 3, pp. 349-355.
Abstract: (1992). Post‐burke: Transcending the sub‐stance of Dramatism. Quarterly Journal of Speech: Vol. 78, No. 3, pp. 349-355.
43 citations
TL;DR: This paper revisited the discussion that followed the 1983 publication of Philip Wander's "The Ideological Turn in Modern Criticism" and pointed out that the critics who opposed Wander's position themselves adhered to a partial and exclusionary academic ideology.
Abstract: This essay revisits the discussion that followed the 1983 publication of Philip Wander's “The Ideological Turn in Modern Criticism.” It reviews the debate briefly, clarifies the meaning of the term “ideological criticism,” and demonstrates that the critics who opposed Wander's position themselves adhered to a partial and exclusionary academic ideology. Specifically, the essay shows how those critics subscribed to an essentialist notion of rhetoric, adopted a theory of innocent reading, and displayed unexamined prejudices about canonical texts. This essay concludes with a call for academic rhetoricians to realize the ethical urgency of their acknowledging that all rhetorical criticism is saturated with ideological presuppositions.
38 citations
TL;DR: The American Female Moral Reform Society (AFRS) was one of the first antebellum reform movements to be founded and controlled by women as mentioned in this paper, and women were able to justify non-traditional actions in the name of traditional values.
Abstract: The American Female Moral Reform Society was one of the first ante‐bellum reform movements to be founded and controlled by women. This paper examines the rhetoric of the society's primary organ, The Advocate of Moral Reform, to discover how these women justified abandoning their traditional feminine roles to pursue social change. The analysis reveals that through skillful casuistic stretching of the feminine ideal, the women were able to justify non‐traditional actions in the name of traditional values. In so doing, the movement also created a new feminist consciousness that recognized the essential victimage of all women and their power to instigate social change.
38 citations
TL;DR: The coining of the Greek word for rhetoric was a watershed event in the history of rhetorical theory in ancient Greece which has been overlooked by most classical rhetoric scholars as mentioned in this paper, which has resulted in a distorted understanding of the Sophists and rhetoric.
Abstract: The coining of the Greek word for rhetoric was a watershed event in the history of rhetorical theory in ancient Greece which has been overlooked by most classical rhetoric scholars. This omission often has resulted in a distorted understanding of the Sophists and “rhetoric.” Prior to the coining of rhetorike, logos was the key term thematized in the texts and fragments we generally assign to the fifth‐century BCE history of rhetorical theory. The texts and fragments concerning logos suggest important differences between the way the art of the discourse was conceptualized before and after the coining of rhetorike. Prior to the coining of rhetorike, the verbal arts were understood as less differentiated and more holistic in scope than they were in the fourth century BCE, and the teaching associated with logos shows considerably less tension between goals of seeking success and seeking truth than is the case once Rhetoric and Philosophy were defined as distinct disciplines.
34 citations
TL;DR: The authors argues that the two principal modes of organizing rhetorical theories in histories of rhetoric, according to influence or systems, are problematic and proposes an alternative critical history that privileges the notions of text, particularity, change, and criticism.
Abstract: This essay argues that the two principal modes of organizing rhetorical theories in histories of rhetoric, according to influence or systems, are problematic. Influence and systems histories frequently mask or distort the particularity of rhetoric's history, and they implicitly disenfranchise future retheorizing of rhetoric. These problems result from the preservative and progressive politics that inhere in the ostensibly neutral organizational devices of influence and systems respectively. In conclusion, the essay forwards an alternative critical history that privileges the notions of text, particularity, change, and criticism.
32 citations
TL;DR: The authors read the Book of Jeremiah as generative rhetoric, an inventive, multivocal response to the catastrophic disruption of a community and its integrated political and spiritual life, expressed and redressed over time through an inventional agon that transforms the textual ethos of prophetic speech into an internally dialogic language of justification.
Abstract: This study in prophetic ethos reads the Book of Jeremiah as generative rhetoric—an inventive, multivocal response to the catastrophic disruption of a community and its integrated political and spiritual life. The disruption is expressed and redressed over time through an inventional agon that transforms the textual ethos of prophetic speech into an internally dialogic language of justification. Dramatis‐tic ratios are invoked to define key configurations in the text where shifts in the symbolic relations between agent, act, and audience reshape the ethos of the prophet and the destiny of the community. Bakhtin's apprehension of polyphony in the novel provides a model for the multivocal development and generative capacity of prophetic ethos in Jeremiah.
TL;DR: Leff in context: What is the critic's role? Quarterly Journal of Speech: Vol. 78, No. 2, pp. 232-237 as mentioned in this paper, 1992].
Abstract: (1992). Leff in context: What is the critic's role? Quarterly Journal of Speech: Vol. 78, No. 2, pp. 232-237.
TL;DR: The Meaning of Vietnam as mentioned in this paper provides an excellent case study for examining the rhetorical demands facing a politician offering a revisionist perspective on cultural history, potentially useful strategies for meeting those demands, and an opportunity to see how a troublesome past can be reframed to make it more "useful" in the present.
Abstract: Secretary of State George P. Shultz delivered a speech entitled “The Meaning of Vietnam” in April 1985. This essay suggests that Shultz's address provides an excellent case study for examining the rhetorical demands facing a politician offering a revisionist perspective on cultural history, potentially useful strategies for meeting those demands, and an opportunity to see how a troublesome past can be reframed to make it more “useful” in the present.
TL;DR: The relationship between the practice of public rhetoric and the nature of political judgment is complex as mentioned in this paper, and a pivotal constitutive controversy, the public Constitutional ratification debate of 1787-1788, uncovers conflicting objects and standards of judgment.
Abstract: The relationship between the practice of public rhetoric and the nature of political judgment is complex. The essay analyzes a pivotal constitutive controversy, the public Constitutional ratification debate of 1787–1788, and uncovers conflicting objects and standards of judgment. The essay demonstrates that Federalists advocated a “formal” and “spectator‐oriented” model of judgment while Anti‐Federalists depicted a “substantive” and “actor‐oriented” model. The concluding section of the essay explores certain theoretical implications (rhetorical distance, interest time, and prudence) that emerge from the constitutive rhetoric of the ratification debate.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors illustrate these ideas from presidential campaign ads used in 1988; conclusions about Campaign ‘88, the rhetorical aspects of negative ads, and the sociocultural dimensions of presidential campaigning generally are drawn.
Abstract: Narrative polispots are mini‐stories that participate in two narrative structures simultaneously: the story being told in the ad (enonce,) and the story being told by the ad (enunciation). The relationships existing between those two structures can affect voters’ positive or negative feelings about a campaign. This essay illustrates these ideas from presidential campaign ads used in 1988; conclusions about Campaign ‘88, the rhetorical aspects of negative ads, and the sociocultural dimensions of presidential campaigning generally are drawn.
TL;DR: The persistence of creationism is a curiosity in an age where the epistemic authority of Darwinian evolution is virtually a commonplace as discussed by the authors, and a rhetorical account for creationism's appeal is explored.
Abstract: The persistence of “scientific creationism” is a curiosity in an age where the epistemic authority of Darwinian evolution is virtually a commonplace. Rather than conceptualizing creationism as strictly a technical discourse or appealing to psychological explanations, this essay explores a rhetorical account for creation‐ism's appeal. It argues that creationism endures not only in spite of the response of the scientific community, but also, in part, because of it. An analysis of the creationism controversy between 1975 and 1990 indicates that the scientific response to creationism misconstrues both the scientific pretensions of creationism and the relative insularity of scientific decision making on questions of public policy. The response ultimately proves unresponsive to the public appeal of creationism which is grounded in an empiricist folk epistemology. This study has implications for our theoretical understandings of the relationships between technical and public discourses and the related relationsh...
TL;DR: This article used post-structuralist theory to explore the utility of a key signifier in that dialogue, the scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer, and found that the meaning of the bomb was created in a cultural dialogue between conflicting interests.
Abstract: Nuclear weapons and the threat of nuclear war are daunting “facts” of contemporary culture. Nonetheless, they are symbolic productions: the meaning of the Bomb historically has been created in a cultural dialogue between conflicting interests. This essay uses post‐structuralist theory to explore the utility of a key signifier in that dialogue, the scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer. During the 1980s, critics interpreted a published volume of Oppenheimer's letters in ways that both clarified and challenged the conventional arrangements of nuclear deterrence. Their responses suggest the enduring value of Oppenheimer as an intertextual form that mediates cultural experience of nuclear weapons.
TL;DR: The 1955 pamphlet, Speak Truth to Power, written by a working party of the American Friends Service Committee, stands as one of the most important pacifist statements of the twentieth century.
Abstract: The 1955 pamphlet, Speak Truth to Power, written by a working party of the American Friends Service Committee, stands as one of the most important pacifist statements of the twentieth century. The authors of the pamphlet faced rhetorical dilemmas particular to an American audience in the mid‐1950s, which led them to adopt rhetorical strategies that have come to be characteristic of the discourse of New Class social movements.
TL;DR: This book presents a meta-history of international communications from 1989 to 2002, a period chosen in order to explore its roots as well as specific cases up to and including the year in which phrases such as “global” and “world” were coined.
Abstract: INTERNATIONAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COMMUNICATIONS. Erik Barnouw, editor in chief. 4 vols. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989. Published jointly with the Annenberg School of Communications, University of Pennsylvania; pp. 1 (Acti‐Deco): xxv+462; 2 (Demo‐Mead): 506; 3 (Mean‐Rumo): 490; 4 (Sapi‐Zwor): 455. $300.
TL;DR: The authors employ some ethnographic exemplars of the communicative use of spitting to illustrate a semiotic investigation of the formal relationship between linguistic and non-linguistic sign systems in face-to-face communication.
Abstract: This essay employs some ethnographic exemplars of the communicative use of spitting to illustrate a semiotic investigation of the formal relationship between linguistic and nonlinguistic sign systems in face‐to‐face communication. It argues that elements from various sign strata not only interact in certain ways in the communicative constitution of reality, but that they may also signify one another. This potential is especially important in situations of uncertain outcome, for through their experiential immediacy nonlinguistic signs contribute to the ritualization of the communication situation. Such signs, iconic in character, emphasize the performativity or eventness of the communication process in which they function as metapropositional elements.
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TL;DR: Woolston's long battle with the church over the legitimacy of literal interpretations of miracles and his introduction into religious debate of a radical language of criticism make Woolston an important figure in the history of religious rhetoric as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The expelled Anglican cleric Thomas Woolston was tried in London for blasphemy in 1729. Woolston's long battle with the church is important to understanding the serious problems facing orthodox Christianity in the early eighteenth century, as well as the radical changes taking place in public attitudes toward religion. This paper assesses Woolston's unusual rhetorical career, his provocative style, and his trial for blasphemy. It focuses special attention on the controversy surrounding Woolston's influential, Six Discourses on the Miracles of our Saviour. His long battle with the church over the legitimacy of literal interpretations of miracles and his introduction into religious debate of a radical language of criticism make Woolston an important figure in the history of religious rhetoric. Moreover, his life demonstrates how the rules of a discourse community can be challenged and changed.
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