Today we will focus on Isocrates–the final of our 4 Greek rhetoricians. First, however, I want to provide some details for your first project.
Project One: What is Rhetoric?
The first project asks you to draw upon our readings, lectures, and discussions thus far to provide a more robust definition to the question “what is rhetoric?” I have asked that you compose your answer as a PechaKechua, which is a name for a presentation format (not a software, just a format). The format consists of twenty images, each lasting 20 seconds. Thus, the whole presentation should be about 6:30 minutes (which means your written script should be about 3-3 1/2 pages, typed and double-spaced).
There is two ways to think about this assignment. First, I am asking that it tell me what rhetoric is (and, perhaps, what it isn’t). Second, I am asking that it show me what rhetoric is by itself being a self-conscious, strategic, rhetorical performance. So, while it doesn’t necessarily have to deploy them explicitly, it should at least perform logos, ethos, pathos, and kairos. Think of Aristotle’s topoi as a recipe guide–how many of those common topics (recheck the Lanham handout) can you incorporate into your response?
I encourage you to be inventive in the way you approach your response, especially as it comes to kairos. What is the time and place for this response? How do you frame it? In light of a contemporary event? And do you call attention to that event through word or image? Both? Can you use images to create provocative juxtapositions between, for instance, what you say and what you show on the screen? Across all the various theorists we have read, I would argue that the first principle of rhetoric is audience (for better, as in Isocrates, or worse, as in Plato). Know your audience: if you haven’t figured it out yet, I am not particularly interested in projects that play it safe.
In terms of what your project has to say, I will try to keep it to a minimum (you only have 3 – 3 1/2 pages, or about 800 words–that is not a lot of room). In addition to offering a definition, I want you to support your definition by referencing two ancient theorists and two contemporary theorists (in either support or definition). Finally, your response must offer one analogy for rhetoric.
In addition to invention, I will be thinking about your project in light of the other major canons:
- Arrangement
- Style
- Delivery
- And, in place of Memory, I will be evaluating your use of images
Finally, a word on recommended technology. For this project, I would recommend using Windows MovieMaker (PC) or iMovie (Mac). Both are pretty easy to use. Chances are you have used one of these programs in another class. It is also possible to automate a PowerPoint, although I believe that is actually more difficult than using MovieMaker (which is free on just about every PC with Windows).
Also, think about how you can play with images. Cropping. “Zooming.” Color. Etc. You might not know it, but you all have free access to Photoshop via the USF Apps portal (assuming you have high speed Internet at home).
Haskins Readings
We have read two articles on Isocrates in preparation for today’s class. Let’s start off by tweeting out one observation from Haskins’ Memesis essay, using the hashtag #enc3371
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Homework
For homework I will ask you to read two more essays (two of my personal favorites) that address the question “what is rhetoric?” The first is Richard Lanham’s “The Q Question” (I will send this out as a .pdf) and the second is Ernesto Grassi’s “Rhetoric as First Philosophy.” Both will think of rhetoric through the Romans: Lanham begins his essay dealing with Quinitilian’s difficulty addressing whether rhetoric is “good.” Lanham identifies two ways to respond to this question. The first he calls the weak defense of rhetoric–we might call this the Platonic defense–and that is that rhetoric is good when I (a good person) uses it to advance (what I consider to be) good truths, and bad when bad people deliver bad ideas. One should quickly recognize the problems such a defense manifests. The strong defense, according to Lanham, should resonate a bit with the charitable reading of Callicles I offered earlier in class: and that is that if we accept that truth doesn’t exist outside of human agreement, then rhetoric is both good and necessary as the art that helps to legislate human disagreement and communication.
Grassi will work out of the Humanist tradition, and make a similar argument based on the work of an ancient Roman rhetorician (Cicero) and a Renaissance humanist (Vico). Enjoy.
