Rhetoric:  An Introduction

CONTENTS:

• What is Rhetoric?
  • etemology
  • classical views
  • later views
• Aims of Rhetoric
• Suggestions for Further Reading

 I.  What is Rhetoric?

A.   Etemology

• rhetorike = art of public speaking

 B.  Classical Views

1.  Plato:  "art of influencing the soul through words."

• When Plato speaks of the soul here, he actually is actually referring primarily to the reasoning faculty of the human person.
  • therefore rhetoric for him is primarily the art of influencing via reason, logic and rational arguments.
• rhetoric involves the use of words  (i.e., speech)
• art = "a body of knowledge capable of being used as a means to specific ends.
  • the end of rhetoric = to influence the soul.

2.  Aristotle:  "faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion."

• faculty = ability.
• Aristotle' understanding of rhetoric is broader than Plato's.
  • allows for appeal to reason, moral sense, emotions, etc., in order to persuade audience.

3. Quintilian: "the science of speaking well."

• Quintilian describes the rhetor as "the good man speaking well."
  • well = expertly and morally.
• emphasis here is on the ethical dimensions of Rhetoric.

C.  Later Views

1. Augustine:  the art of moving the soul to God by effectively proclaiming the Christian message

• Augustine and the early fathers of the Church had and often ambiguous attitude towards rhetoric
  • St. Jerome denounced rhetoric along with all worldly wisdom as "the food of the devil."
  • In the Confessions Augustine describes rhetoric "mere verbiage, a combination of guile and deceit, disguised by sheer verbosity."  (Ijsseling, 42)
• later came to see rhetoric in a positive light when he realized that it could be used to bring people to the Christian faith.

2.  High Middle Ages:  one of the Seven Liberal Arts

• liber = free:  
  • Liberal Arts are those arts that free human beings from ignorance
• Truvium:  liberal arts
  • grammar:  art of using language properly
  • dialectics:  art of reasoning well
  • rhetoric:  art of speaking well
• Quadrivium:  Liberal Sciences
  • arithmatic
  • geometry
  • astronomy
  • music

3.  Modern:  art of persuasion by whatever means necessary in all available media.

• in classical word main form of communication was the spoken word
  • today rhetoric can be found in oral, written and visual media
  • e.g., the Internet is becoming a new venue for rhetoric
• the always tenuous connection between ethics and rhetoric is rapidly disappearing in our own times.
  • e.g., think about how far a political candidate will go to persuade you to vote for for him or a company will go to get you to buy its products.

II.  Aims of Rhetoric

1.  What is the Purposes of Public Speech?

• to entertain
• to inform
• to convince*
• to persuade*                    *domain of rhetoric

2.  Aim of the Rhetor: 

• attempts to convince or persuade an audience
• in order to win their support
• for some cause or truth that he espouses

3. He does this by...

a) convincing

• appeal to reason
• tries to convince an audience his arguments are sound

b) persuading

• appeal to specific emotions  (prejudice, anger, fear, duty, love)
• this is the real realm of rhetoric !!!!!
• To quote Emerson: "Him we call an artist, who shall play upon an assembly of men as a master on the keys of the piano,—who seeing the people furious, shall soften and compose them, shall draw them, when he will, to laughter and to tears.  Bring him to his audience, and, be they who they may, curse or refined, pleased or displeased, sulky or savage, with their opinions in the keeping of a confessor, or with their opinions in their bank safes,—he will have them pleased and humored as he chooses; and they shall carry and execute that which he bids them." 

4. The Test of Rhetoric

• The true test of rhetor lies, not in how eloquently he speaks, but  in whether or not he has persuaded his audience. 
• "A speaker who exhausts the whole philosophy of a question,"  writes Macualay, " who displays every grace of style, yet produces no effect in his audience, may be a great essayist, a great statesman, a great master of composition, but he is not an orator."
• The ultimate test:  (1) did your audience buy your product? (2) did they vote for your candidate? (3) did they come to agree with your position? 
  • if not, your rhetoric is flawed because it has failed to persuade

Suggestions for Further Reading:

• Barilli, Renato. Rhetoric.  Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 1998
• Bryant, D,C., ed.  Ancient Greek and Roman Rhetoricians: A Biographical Dictionary.  Columbia, MO: Artcraft, 1968.
• Cole, Thomas, The Origins of Rhetoric in Ancient Greece.  Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1991.
• Ijsseling, Samuel.  Rhetoric and Philosophy in Conflict.  The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1976.
• Kennedy, George.  The Art of Persuasion in Greece.   Princeton: Princeton UP, 1963.
• ---.  The Art of Rhetoric in the Roman World.  Princeton: Princeton Up, 1972.
• ---. A New History of Classical Rhetoric.  Princeton: Princeton UP, 1994.
• Murphy, James J., ed.  A Synoptic History of Classical Rhetoric.  Davis, CA: Hermagoras, 1983.
• Shurter, Edwin Du Bois.  The Rhetoric of Oratory.   New York:  Macmilllan, 1920.