Tag: ethos

PAB #4 (Methods & Methodology)

Leave a comment

Sipiora, Phillip. “Ethical Argumentation in Darwin’s Origin of the Species.” Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory, edited by James S. Baumlin and Tita French Baumlin, Southern Methodist University Press, 1995, 265-292.

Sipiora, using a discourse analysis methodology, rhetorically analyses Darwin’s foundational darwintext, On the Origin of Species. Sipiora claims that this scientific discourse breaks traditions in moving away from the conventions of scientific demonstrations as Darwin writes an ethical argument or a “quasi-scientific treatise” (266). The expositor-narrator (speaker) is constantly aware of and seeking to built a relationship of trust with the reader (audience). He does so using three of Aristotle’s subappeals: virtue (arete), goodwill (eunoia), and good sense (phronesis) (266).

ethos

Virtue (arete) is found in Darwin’s passive constructions, establishment of professional integrity, patterns of self-effacement, third-person references, stative verbs, and catenative constructions. In utilizing these rhetorical devices, Darwin rests his dependence “on his attempts to involve the reader in the progressive development of the argument” (276). His “self-deprecating, self-correcting stance is a persuasive ethical strategy,” which Sipiora argues is key to his ethical argumentation (275).

Darwin’s use of goodwill (eunoia) is key in the “conjoining of rhetor and audience in a common endeavor” (276). This is accomplished through rhetorical devices such as identification rhetorical pronoun usage (we, our), rhetorical questioning, value appeals, first-person references (to highlight collective ignorance), and conditional clauses (if). Sipiora calls Darwin’s use of goodwill a “double-edged strategy…[and] a powerful rhetorical weapon…[for] simultaneous bonding with and manipulating of the reader” (279, 280).

Lastly, Darwin highlights good sense (phronesis) in his emphasis on probability. Comment clauses, integration of both first and third person pronouns (I, we), and strategic location of his argument within “accepted scientific investigation” all work together to “appeal to common sense” (282).  Readers “are forced to rely on the good judgment of the expositor” because of our general lack of scientific knowledge and our ignorance exploited through these subappeals (287).

First Edition showing theological quotes by William Whewell & Francis Bacon

While Sipiora is not claiming that Darwin ignores pathos and logos, he is claiming that ethos was more important to Darwin in the writing of this text as “it is crucial that the scientific rhetor create a persona that emanates credibility” because of the time in which the book was published in 1859 (269). In fact, Darwin was so sure that the Church of the time would see the text as heretical, the first edition opened with two theological quotes to start establishing his credibility with his audience immediately. Sipiora ends by addressing the “so what” question: “Perhaps exploring the rhetoric of ethics in scientific texts will lead us to ask generative questions about ethical dimensions and implications far beyond the texts themselves” (288).

Sipiora’s multidisciplinary argument is unique in that it is analyzing a scientific text through a rhetorical lens. Typically, scientific discourse falls into the technical writing territory. Sipiora’s claim that Darwin’s text is in fact a rhetorical argument fits within the scope of Carolyn R. Miller’s claim that the positivist legacy of scientific discourse relaying Truth (uppercase implying absolute) isn’t valid. All writing is arguing for an interpretation of the world around us and is therefore arguing for truth (lowercase implying subjective). Considering Sipiora’s argument, Darwin’s text just might be proof of that claim.

I selected this article to demonstrate the rhetorical methodology of discourse analysis and because it deals with identification. In fact, Sipiora directly references Kenneth Burke’s identification: “The expositor-narrator must share some of the reader’s basic assumptions, what Kenneth Burke calls ‘identification,’ and it is this evolving identification with the reader that makes the Origin such a powerful rhetorical argument” (268). Burke’s theories of consubstantiality are of particular interest to me based on my personal course outcomes to explore major theorists and conversations surrounding rhetoric of identity.

Works Cited

Miller, C. R. “A humanistic rationale for technical writing.” College English, vol. 40, no. 6, 1979, pp. 610-617.

Paper #2: Major Questions

3 Comments

Aristotle’s Rhetorical Situation

        While the major questions utilized by rhetoricians of identity have largely branched out into various directions, the common foundation does harken back to the classical concept of the rhetorical situation. The rhetor and the audience are the dominant points of connectivity when it comes to analyzing identity portrayal and perceptions. These two focal points highlight two of the major questions:

  1. What are the rhetor’s intentions and how does he/she want to be perceived?
  2. How much of the rhetor’s identity is determined by the audience? (Depew).

Each of these inquiries yields a series of sub-questions.

        When analyzing a rhetor’s intentions and identity portrayal, Aristotelian questions arise: what rhetorical tools are available to the rhetor and to what extent is he/she using those tools to persuade an audience? What challenges does the rhetor face in establishing the identity construct necessary to successfully persuade an audience (Depew)? For example, a white, young female teacher may have a difficult time in teaching a largely black/minority high school class because these audience members might associate with a certain people group. Take the nonfiction story of Freedom Writers. Erin Gruwell, the highlighted teacher, struggles to gain the trust of her “audience,” in this case a classroom full of students, because she does not look like them and is in an authority position of which they have come to be leery. Her rhetorical tools revolve around reaching into her students’ culture and pulling out artifacts to which they can relate and from which they can learn through familiar out-of-school literacies. freedomwritersstillcap2

        Sub-questions surrounding the analysis of the audiences’ perceptions of any given rhetor involve an audience’s awareness of social context. Does the audience see the rhetor’s identity as enacted through the social context? Does the audience see the rhetor’s identity as monolithic or fragmented, meaning reliant upon the rhetorical situation at hand (Depew)? This second question can also be inverted and applied back to the rhetor as well.

        These issues stemming from the rhetorical situation also point to questions of terminology. One term used in these conversations is consubstantiality, popularized by Kenneth Burke through his rhetorical theories of identity. Burke uses this term to describe someone who is both joined with and separate from another person or group. Louis Althusser uses subjectivity when describing the identity construct one assumes within an ideological framework. These more recent terms were preceded by Aristotle’s concept of ethos, which has probably changed and evolved the most over the past 2,000+ years. While Aristotle originally used the term as a site of persuasion, scholars and theorists have tailored the definition to modern culture and individual research projects. Susan C. Jarratt and Nedra Reynolds, for example, trace various uses of the term ethos etymologically. They “reread classical ethos through feminist history,” which reveals that while older definitions of ethos point to customs or habits, newer notions point to character (40). Ultimately, their rereading allows for a classical notion of ethos that will acknowledge difference and therefore give voice to feminism (50). Experience and difference become integral to an understanding of the feminist rhetor.

        With a slightly different angle on the term ethos, Marshall W. Alcorn Jr. argues for a definition of “ethos as a relationship existing between the discourse structures of selves and the discourse structures of ‘texts’” (6). Aristotle’s ethos implies that an audience, always passive, can be persuaded by the mere character of the speaker. His primary claim is that the self is ultimately a rhetorical entity as the two act upon one another: “The self is stable enough to resist change and changeable enough to admit to rhetorical manipulation but not so changeable as to constantly respond, chameleonlike, to each and every social force” (17). These changes require effective rhetoric with stylistic devices tailored to an audience well-researched. Alcorn deals with not only the question of terms and definitions, but also with the sub-question relating to rhetor’s identity as reliant upon social and rhetorical context and fragmented rather than monolithic.

        Feminist scholars and queer theorists have also recently taken up the conversation and given the research questions related to rhetorical identity constructs a gender focus. Judith Butler, for example, asks how identity is ultimately established through performative acts. Jacques Lacan questions society’s role in identity construction. Ultimately, while major

Barthes’ “The Death of the Author”

questions connected to identity constructs do still point to the foundational rhetorical situation, there has been a significant postmodern shift away from the rhetor’s intention and intended identity portrayal. Roland Barthes, for example, in “The Death of the Author” puts all the interpretive power in the hands of the audience. These might be the most significant historical shifts in major questions from Aristotle to current theorists: agency now lies with the audience and society.

My personal learning outcomes are always connected in part to how I can apply theory to my own pedagogy to improve practice in my classroom. Jarratt and Reynolds’ reread ethos has pedagogical implications in that it can move student writing past the general audience and “Everyman” voice that students are accustomed to and comfortable with. With a framing of difference and multiplicity, teachers can encourage student writers to “split and resuture textual selves” through their writing (57). To me, this is dangerous territory as student identity constructs are largely unstable to begin with. There are ethical considerations for all theories we expose students to and encourage them to explore. Is it then unethical to potentially shake their identities in such a way? Or do we as instructors have an ethical obligation to expose them to a myriad of identity theories as they are seeking their writing voice? This might be a landscape for rhetorical analysis of identity.

Works Cited

Alcorn, Marshall W. Jr. “Self-Structure as a Rhetorical Device: Modern Ethos and the   Divisiveness of the Self.” Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory, edited by James S. Baumlin and Tita French Baumlin, Southern Methodist University Press, 1995, 3-35.

Althusser, Louis. “From Ideology and State Apparatuses.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed., edited by Vincent B. Leitch, et al., W.W. Norton & Company, 2010, 1335-1360.

Barthes, Roland. “The Death of the Author.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed., edited by Vincent B. Leitch, et al., W.W. Norton & Company, 2010, 1322-1326.

Burke, Kenneth. “From A Rhetoric of Motives.” The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present, edited by Patricia Bizzell and Bruce Herzberg, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2001, 1324-1340.

Butler, Judith. “From Gender Trouble.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed., edited by Vincent B. Leitch, et al., W.W. Norton & Company, 2010, 2540-2552.

Depew, Kevin. Personal interview. 5 October 2016.

Jarratt, Susan C., and Nedra Reynolds. “The Splitting Image: Contemporary Feminisms and the Ethics of ethos.” Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory, edited by James S. Baumlin and Tita French Baumlin, Southern Methodist University Press, 1995, 37-63.

Lacan, Jacques. “From The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed., edited by Vincent B. Leitch, et al., W.W. Norton & Company, 2010, 1169-1180.

PAB Entry #2 (Major Questions)

Leave a comment

Jarratt, Susan C., and Nedra Reynolds. “The Splitting Image: Contemporary Feminisms and the Ethics of ethos.” Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory, edited by James S. Baumlin and Tita French Baumlin, Southern Methodist University Press, 1995, 37-63.

     In moving away from a traditional Aristotelian sense of ethos, Jarratt and Reynolds marry sophist rhetoric and feminist theory to define ethos in a manner that recognizes difference and therefore makes a space for gender theory. Neither deconstruction nor Enlightenment era notions of the self work for feminist ethos; deconstructionism destabilizes the self in such a way that also destabilizes feminism. The Enlightenment era clings to Aristotelian notions of the self that don’t allow for difference. However, from Isocrates to Protagoras and Gorgias, sofaistrythese sophists connect character formation to adjusting community standards. This, basically the work of ideology, creates a space for an alliance between sophistic rhetoric and feminism (47).

     Utilizing a multidisciplinary approach that relies on feminism, rhetoric, and poststructuralism, the authors are able to “reread classical ethos through feminist history” (40). While older definitions of ethos point to customs or habits, newer notions point to character. Neither of these totally serve the purposes of feminist rhetorical goals. A rereading highlights character development through custom and habit (44). By tracing etymological definitions for key terms such as as ethea and nomos, the authors are able to locate a connection to the newer term of positionality, coined within this context by Linda Alcoff. It is precisely this “‘place from which values are interpreted and constructed rather than as a locus of an already determined set of values’” that allows a rereading of the classical notion of ethos that will acknowledge difference and therefore give voice to feminism (50). Experience and difference become integral to an understanding of the feminist rhetor.

     The authors champion a feminist standpoint theory that would celebrate difference to the point that any marginalized person can benefit from this redefined notion of ethos, which requires listeners to identify with the speaker. This inverts Aristotle’s traditional concept of ethos in which the speaker attempts to persuade an audience by highlighting similarities. Donna Haraway cinches the redefined ethos in her epistemological turn to the multiplicity of the speaker, which would allow for splitting instead of being. After all, “subjectivity is multidimensional…always constructed and stitched together imperfectly, and therefore able to join with another, to see together without claiming to be another” (55).

     Jarratt and Reynolds conclude with a brief application to the classroom. This reread ethos has pedagogical implications in that it can move student writing past the general audience and “Everyman” voice that students are accustomed to and comfortable with. With a framing of difference and multiplicity, teachers can encourage student writers to “split and resuture textual selves” through their writing (57). To me, this is dangerous territory as student identity constructs are largely unstable to begin with. There are ethical considerations for all theories we expose them to and encourage them to explore. Is it then unethical to potentially shake their identities in such a way? Or do we as instructors have a moral obligation to expose them to a myriad of identity theories as they are seeking their writing voice? This might be where a landscape for rhetoric of identity analysis.

PAB Entry #2 (Major Questions)

Leave a comment

Alcorn, Marshall W. Jr. “Self-Structure as a Rhetorical Device: Modern Ethos and the   Divisiveness of the Self.” Ethos: New Essays in Rhetorical and Critical Theory, edited by James S. Baumlin and Tita French Baumlin, Southern Methodist University Press, 1995, 3-35.

Alcorn argues for a reconception of ethos in both building upon and moving away from traditional (Aristotelian) definitions of ethos and poststructuralist (Rorty) definitions of the self. He argues for a definition of “ethos as a relationship existing between the discourse structures of selves and the discourse structures of ‘texts’” (6). The ancient Greek understanding of the self was conceptualized more as a character, defined and enacted by society. ethos_pathos_logosAristotle’s ethos implies that an audience, always passive, can be persuaded by the mere character of the speaker. Rorty goes further in defining the components of any self-structure as an evolution of four entities: character, person, self, and individual. It is not until the final stage, the individual, that one is free to select his or her identity construct. Alcorn agrees with the notion that “history shapes selves,” but the self is not passively shaped as it “can dialectically engage and resist…social interaction (12, 14). His main claim is that the self is ultimately a rhetorical entity as the two act upon one another: “The self is stable enough to resist change and changeable enough to admit to rhetorical manipulation but not so changeable as to constantly respond, chameleonlike, to each and every social force” (17). These changes require effective rhetoric with stylistic devices tailored to an audience well-researched.

The above theoretical considerations carry implications for a revision to the signified associated with the signifier ethos. While Alcorn isn’t claiming that either approach (Aristotelian or poststructuralist) is outdated, he is saying they are restrictive in light of the “prodigious diversity, plurality, and multiplicity” of our modern culture (18). These cultural characteristics have yielded a society full of divided, conflicted, and anxious selves. In utilizing a multidisciplinary approach, Alcorn taps into psychoanalysis through Freud’s ego freudmodeltheories. It is precisely these “inner voices” that a rhetor needs to tap into in order to rhetorically impact the self-structure. Alcorn also looks to sociological theories of leadership in the charismatic leader; it is the charismatic leader who is a “master of ethos” as he or she can communicate self (24). All of these discussions ultimately point to a modern ethos that is an “aesthetic manipulation of self-division” (28).

Literature and critical theory also reflect this modern concept of the divided self. In fact, Alcorn dedicates several pages to an analysis of Orwell’s essay “Shooting an Elephant” to highlight the potential available to an author (or speaker) with a modern ethos. Lastly, Alcorn discusses the pedagogical implications of such a revision to the concept of ethos. If teachers can facilitate class discussions so as to tap into the self-structures of our modern culture’s divided student identities, rhetoric can impact change to these learning selves.

Alcorn’s argument is in response to some of the basic research questions surrounding the topic of rhetoric of identity: How does rhetoric connect to and affect/impact identity? He personalizes this question to seek out a relationship between the self and language that leads him to a conclusion that the two (rhetoric and identity) are co-dependent: one yields the other and vice versa.