English 691.01
Spring 2014
The History of Rhetoric:
Enlightenment through Contemporary
Wednesday 6:30-9:20
MHRA 1304
Instructor:
Stephen R. Yarbrough
Professor
3206 MHRA
334-3282 (Office)
292-1186 (Home)
Office Hours:By appointment only.
Texts:
Conley, Thomas M. Rhetoric in the European Tradition. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1990.
Foss, Sonja K. Contemporary Perspectives on Rhetoric. 3rd ed. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2002.
Bizzell, Patricia and Bruce Herzberg. The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present. Boston: St. Martins Press, 1990.
Links to online texts are in the schedule.
Course Description
This seminar will explore major developments in rhetorical theory from the Enlightenment through the early 21st century, with a special emphasis on the impact on rhetoric study made by other disciplines, such as philosophy, psychology, sociology, physics, and anthropology.
Course Requirements:
1. You will write two brief (approximately 10 typed pages) research papers or one full-length (approximately 20 page) research paper. You should think of these as being on-the-way to publication: they should be forays into new turf of some sort—new material, new methods applied to old material, new questions about old issues, a new perspective on old or current arguments, etc.
These papers should be well written and documented appropriately in either MLA or Chicago style. At least two weeks prior to their due dates, you should submit to me a one-page description of your project for approval. (Short papers, 25% of your total grade, each; long paper, 50% of your final grade.)
Note: Master’s students (only) may substitute one 8-10 page annotated bibliography on one of the assigned authors for one of the short papers.
2. This is a seminar. Each week, one or two students will be primarily responsible for the class discussion. Be prepared to focus upon difficult passages; key issues; historical context; current scholarly opinion; philosophical, political, religious, etc. ramifications; textual, especially interdisciplinary connections; and any other relevant considerations. This is your chance to tailor the topic to your own special interests and concerns. However, it is your responsibility to make sure that all members of the class have copies of, or easy access to, any additional material you wish us to consider or be familiar with at least one week prior to the class meeting. A Blackboard site has been set up for this purpose.
When it’s your turn to take responsibility for the class, think of me as a “co-facilitator” only, or maybe as an unusually long-winded student who has taken this course before that you can count on to fill up the “dead space.” I hope to be able to write each of you excellent teaching recommendations, as well as scholarly recommendations, as a result of your participation in this class. (Discussion leadership, 25% of your total grade.)
3. Class participation is very important, and when it’s your turn to keep the class going for three hours, you’ll see just how important it is. The success of a course like this one depends upon everyone’s informed involvement. (Participation, 25% of your total grade.)
Schedule:
Week 1 (Jan. 15): Introduction to the course
Readings:
CPR pp. 1-18
Week 2(Jan. 22): 18th Century—John Locke; David Hume
Readings:
RET pp. 188-216
RT pp. 814-827; 828-840
WWW: Locke, An Essay concerning Human Understanding” Book III, Chaps. 1-5 (pp. 145-174).
Week 3(Jan. 29): 18th Century—Giambattista Vico; George Campbell
Readings:
RET pp. 216-25
RE pp. 862-878; 898-946;
Week 4 (Feb. 5)): 18th/19th Centuries—Hugh Blair; Richard Whately
Readings:
RET pp. 220-25; 235-41
RE pp. 947-79
Week 5(Feb. 12): 19th Century—Alexander Bain; Adams Sherman Hill; Ralph Waldo Emerson
Readings:
RET pp. 242-53
RT pp. 1141-1151
WWW: Emerson, “Nature.”
Week 6(Feb. 19): 19th Century—Herbert Spencer; Friedrich Nietzsche
Readings:
RT Spencer, 1152-1167
RT Nietzsche, 1168-1179
Week 7(Feb. 26): 19th / 20th Century—Charles Sanders Peirce; George Herbert Mead
Readings:
Peirce, “Ideas, Stray or Stolen, About Scientific Writing, No. 1” Available on Blackboard.
“The Fixation of Belief”
WWW: Available on Blackboard.
Mead, “A Behavioristic Account of the Significant Symbol”
WWW: on Blackboard.
“Meaning” WWW:
Week 8(Mar. 5): 20th Century—Mikhail Bakhtin; Virginia Woolf
Readings:
RT pp. 1206-1245; 1246-1260
--SPRING BREAK--
Week 9(Mar. 19): 20th Century—I. A. Richards; Richard Weaver
Readings:
RET pp. 260-68; 277-81
CPR pp. 19-50; 155-86
RT pp. 1270-1294; 1348-1371
Week 10(Mar. 26): 20th Century—Jürgen Habermas; Ernesto Grassi
Readings:
RET pp. 299-303
CPR pp. 51-80; 233-64
Habermas, “Communicative Ethics.”
Available on Blackboard.
Grassi, “Rhetoric and Philosophy” Janus Head (Spring 2000 3.1)
Week 11(April 2): 20th Century—Chaim Perelman and Lucie Obrechts-Tyteca; Stephen Toulmin
Readings:
RT pp. 1372-1409; 1410-1431
RET pp. 291-298
CPR pp. 81-154
Week 12(April 9): 20th Century—Kenneth Burke
Readings:
RET pp. 268-77
CPR pp. 187-232
RT pp. 1295-1347
Week 13(April 16): 20th Century—Jacques Derrida; Jean Baudrillard; Michel Foucault
Readings:
CPR pp. 299-338; 339-378
RT pp. 1432-1470; 1471-1491
Week 14(April 23): 21stCentury—David R. Russell; Bill Brown; Gunther Kress
Readings:
Russell, “Activity Theory and Its Implications for Writing Instruction”
. Also available as a .pdf on Blackboard.
Brown, “Thing Theory.” Critical Inquiry 28.1 (Autumn 2001): 1-22. Available as a .pdf on Blackboard.
Kress, "'English' at the Crossroads: Rethinking Curricula of Communication in the Context of the Turn to the Visual." Ed. Gail Hawisher and Cynthia Selfe. Passions, Pedagogies, and the 21st Century Technologies. Logan, UH: Utah State U, 1999. 66-88. Available as a .pdf on Blackboard.
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