Blog for October 2nd, 2014: The Signifying Paul and Other Thoughts

For anybody who religiously checks this blog at midnight on Tuesdays, I apologize for my few hours of tardiness. This post ended up being a lot longer than I intended it to be (you should see the drafts), and ended up being slightly delayed as a result. Thank you for your patience.

Mark Noe- “The Corrido: A Border Rhetoric” 

and

Victor Villanueva- “Maybe a Colony: And Still Another Critique of the Comp Community”

I really enjoyed the Noe piece on an aesthetic level. Noe’s writing was pleasantly flowing, and I found myself enjoying the rhythm. This was helped along by the pacing and presentation of the arguments- every time I found a flaw or argument against his statements, the text would almost immediately turn to address whatever topic I was concerned about. I wasn’t too fond of Villanueva’s writing style or some of the claims made. However, both authors were impressive in that I found myself agreeing completely with their final conclusions. In both cases, the authors are arguing for cultural awareness, but acknowledge the impossibility of their full desires. In Noe’s case, the (white) folks in positions of power, such as himself, will forever be unable to accurately occupy border rhetoric, but can strive to do their best to still engage with it and present ideas to students. In Villanueva’s case, he wishes for an even more impossible status shift- the raising of non-dominant cultural styles to the same status as the dominant discourse format- but settles for a much simpler goal. Villanueva ends up being happy as long as the non-dominant discourse is merely acknowledged as not deficient and given some attention. In both cases, the goals are so incredibly mundane and timid, yet still impossibly hard to get done.

(As something of a minor grievance- it is somewhat disappointing that the key authority on Corridos happens to be the Jewish academic Americo Paredes. Paredes did indeed do a massive amount of scholarship and work for the Mexican-American community, but it’s hard not to be somewhat frustrated by the fact that a white Texan is the one behind the definitive section of academia on a part of Mexican-America culture and history.)

Henry Louis Gates- “The Signifying Monkey”

I feel like there are some problems with the claims that Gates makes in this article. I will absolutely defer to the fact that he is a better scholar of African and African-American history than I am. However, I am extremely confused by his preference for Monkey as the key trickster figure. While Monkey is certainly a popular form for the trickster, his justification of Monkey as the key American version of the figure falls flat for me. Assuming that Gates is correct, and that Monkey is derived from Esu/Eshu, then I can only presume that the other tricksters of American folklore are derived from the same origin. Which means that it makes no sense to favor Monkey, as his presence in general American and African-American culture is absolutely dwarfed by other trickers. Monkey is perhaps more popular than Jack of Tales*- I couldn’t say without traveling out to the more Eastern parts of the USA, as he certainly has no presence here on the west coast. However, ignoring the presence of Jack, we are still left with the two giants of African tricksters- Anansi and Brer Rabbit. Anansi/Spider possess a universal popularity that is marked by the numerous books and products referencing or based in its mythos. I originally had a complicated set of ideas to explain how Brer Rabbit was the absolute definitive trickster of American folklore. However, a far more obvious and direct example came to mind. Gates claims that it is the obscenity that distinguishes Monkey from Anansi, but it is exactly this obscenity that relegates Monkey to third-place status. And, to make absolutely clear- Anansi and Brer Rabbit posses literally every relevant trait that Gates lists in his explanation of Monkey and Signifyin(g), except for explicit obscenity through cursing. Therefore, I can’t buy into his insistence that cursing is essential to the Signifyin(g) experience. It seems like it simply far too easy to signify in the absolute rudest ways without saying a single dirty word.

I’m also a little baffled by the implication that the trickster is a wholly African or African-American construct. I am a huge fan of Monkey/Anansi/Brer Rabbit, but they are merely in the pantheon of tricksters of the world. As somebody from Southern California, it was impossible to avoid tales about Coyote, the Native American version of the trickster. Although a more understated and subtle variation, literally everybody on Earth now knows about Loki, the Viking trickster. I am far from sold on the notion that Signifyin(g) is tied to black culture, and I am somewhat inclined to believe that it is a position of behavior occupied by those who don’t have the choice of speaking directly.

Beyond these thoughts, it took me some time to understand what Gates was claiming, and some more time to fully process it. However, after mulling over the topic and parsing the concepts, I think I finally understood it through comprehending its opposite- institutional communication. Academic language, in particular, has very little room for the ambiguity and manipulation that characterize the style of rhetoric that Gates is discussing. It is a sharp-witted artistic style of communication, one that avoids deliberate explication for the sake of avoiding deliberate explication. If a situation is spelled out too explicitly and directly (traits that define academic writing), then it loses its ability to be a protective covering as a game, and becomes a liability, a risk.

*There is a character in a fairly popular comic book series who happens to be called the similarly-inpsired Jack of Fables. This Jack is also largely derived from the idea of a recurrent folklore trickster character being the same person, but his personality is colored by deriving some of his attitudes and experiences from euro-centric tales such as “Jack and The Beanstalk” than the Jack of purely American folklore. 

I am deriving the Jack of Tales name and character from Zora Neal Hurston’s Of Mules and Men- a book that Gates references and criticizes, while failing to acknowledge Jack’s existence. I found this disappointing.

I had a lot of trouble with this next segment. I wrote four or five different variations on it, and was never really satisfied with what I managed to come up with. Finally, I realized that I could turn to my favorite form of articulation- cultural appropriation through parody. In this case, I have decided to try my own hand at Signifyin(g) through a “Monkey” tale. I have some concerns about my presentation, such as the use of the term “Monkey” possibly being offensive, but I have decided to stick with the format in order to maintain the stylistic consistency of the topic that Gates covered. As I have indicated, you can replace “Monkey” and the jungle setting with any other trickster cipher, and the meaning remains the same. I’m also sure that Mr. Gates would not be very fond of this story, but that’s the whole point of Signifyin(g), ain’t it? I mean, I’m not signifying at him, but if the shoe fits…

Monkey and the Home Invasion

Although Monkey is a wily trickster, he doesn’t only spend his time playing pranks. In fact, one time, Eshu went on vacation to China, spending a whole month there. When Monkey returned to the jungle, he found that his tree had become overgrown, making it impossible to roost in. Being the resourceful critter that he was, Monkey quickly devised a way to clear away enough leaves recreate his home. 

However, what Monkey didn’t notice was that Hen was sleeping in some shade nearby. The bustle of Monkey clearing leaves woke her up. Being the neurotic creature that she was, Hen only took the briefest glance to confirm that there was something in the tree before quietly scurrying off to Lion, King of the jungle. She breathlessly squawked to the court “Help!Help!SomethingisdestroyingMonkey’shome!”

Lion and Monkey were never on the best of terms, but Lion knew that it was his responsibility to protect the order of the jungle. Although Hen was known for exaggerating stories, he decided to play it safe. He ordered the Boars to travel to Monkey’s tree and make sure that everything was safe and under control. When the boars arrived at Monkey’s tree, everything was quiet and peaceful. The tree seemed to be perfectly pruned, and there was a furry creature sleeping on the highest branch. Since they weren’t positive that the furry creature was Monkey, the Boars decided to best course of action was to treat the situation as a deadly threat, and began ramming the tree. Monkey was jostled and bounced about, and he fell out of the tree, landing in front of the Boars.

“What is going on? I was just sleeping in my tree after a long trip, and now I find my ousted from my home and my home damaged by you Boars! What is the meaning behind all of this?” Monkey asked.

The Boars could clearly see that this furry creature was indeed Monkey, and this was indeed Monkey’s house. This didn’t concern the Boars much. They had come there to stop the monster who had broken into Monkey’s tree, and they were going to do so. Even if the monster turned out to be Monkey himself. Monkey continued to blather on about how he had rights and that it didn’t make sense for them to doing this to him. But, the Boars had never been fond of Monkey and his talking was disrespecting their authority. So, they began trampling Monkey where he lay, making sure that he was totally incapacitated. They then dragged Monkey all the way to Lion, where they proudly presented their capture. Lion, stunned by this turn of events, called their capture an embarrassment and demanded they return Monkey home with no further punishment to be administered to Monkey.

When he was returned to his tree, Monkey angrily declared that he would not stand for such treatment, as he was a smart and clever Monkey peacefully enjoying time in his own home, and that the Boars should not be allowed to act in such a way to any Monkeys. However, the Boars have a very strong union, and all the Boars in Jungle gathered to protest the harsh statements made about them. First, they traveled around the jungle explaining that they were the only thing that kept the rest of the jungle safe, and without them, every other animal would immediately start killing each other and everything would be destroyed. Then, they explained that Monkey was just a naughty monkey and that he should have never disrespected the authority of Boars, and therefore he got everything that he deserved for resisting. The Boars had a wide reach, and soon many of the animals of the jungle began protesting how Monkey and Lion had responded to the Boars. Lion, being the secretly spineless coward that he was, wanted to avoid any chance of destabilizing the order of the jungle. So, he immediately caved to the Boar Union, and publicly apologized for criticizing their treatment of Monkey. He described his own statements as too rash, and labeled the entire thing a “Teachable Moment” for himself in how he could avoid making rash statements.

Of course, this was not enough for the Boars. They wanted an apology from Monkey, too. But, they knew that Monkey was far too smart and stubborn to ever apologize for being trampled for the crime of being a monkey in his own tree. Monkey would simply continue to spread the lies of the truth of the situation, and that was simply unbearable for the Boars to fathom. So, they turned their lobbying force to Lion once again, and pressured him to force Monkey to apologize to them. Now, Lion didn’t want to completely lose the favor of those who still sympathized with Monkey, so he proposed an alternative to the Boars, an alternative that the boars found quite agreeable.

Instead of a public apology from Monkey, Lion declared a “Beer Summit”, where the Boars and Monkey would have a few drinks together and hash out their differences regarding the topic. This was absolutely perfect for the Boars, because it trapped Monkey in an untenable position. If he went to the Beer Summit, he would be admitting that he had fault in the situation, and that the Boars did indeed deserve an apology. If he refused to go to the Beer Summit, it would demonstrate that he was nothing more than a stubborn and rude monkey who refused to compromise in debates, and that he had no respect for Lion’s authority. So, Monkey went to the Beer Summit. Nobody knows exactly what was said there, but it doesn’t matter, as the Boars got what they wanted. At the summit, they presented Monkey with the vines they had used to drag him. They called it a gift. The jungle was calmed, and everybody went back to calling the Boars heroes and Monkey a troublemaker.

Monkey went home, and donated the vines to a museum. Then he wrote a documentary about how Lion was a hero. The documentary won a Peabody award.

The End

Bonus Blog Extravaganza: On the Rhetoric of Blogging

I began blogging some time around 1999-2001. I was somewhere in the range of eight to eleven years old, and under the delusion that people would care about my opinions on the world. 

I didn’t even have an idea of what a blog was at the time*- I just wanted to have my own website to tell people how much I liked awesome things like video games and pudding. I believe it ended up having over twice as much content as your average internet blogs- I made it all the way to five posts before I abandoned it. From there on out, I have been blogging and posting online in a variety of ways. For a period of a few years in my teenage days, the Gawker Network had some of the most popular websites around, and I spent a lot of time posting in the comments on their pages. Now, at the time, Gawker had an invite-only comment system, and posts would only have a handful of comments. This meant that commenters were basically unpaid content contributors to their sites. I didn’t really care at the time, because my posts were being read by tens of thousands of people, while my personal blogs would pull in may a few hundred hits a year. 

Over time, this system died off in favor of the mass market system of commentating that has turned the internet into a cesspool. With the advent of Tumblr, Reddit, Instagram, Pinterest, etc, etc, there is no longer any time for anybody to actually consume meaningful content on the internet. Humanity has always been marked by a slavish adherence to already established social groups and constructs, resulting in the majority of the populace never extending their thought processes beyond memetic behavior. However, in prior times, the barrier of entry to production of content was fairly costly, allowing for a sort of an elite/passion-based centralization of new material to engage with. Now, we are all far too busy producing our own content to waste our time reading through a complex multi-page screed on anything. Your adherence to factions is not demonstrated by your consumption of key figureheads as much as it is defined by your ability to regurgitate the party line in your own style, on your form of social media. This leaves very little room for blogging.

Now, as much as I enjoy getting distracted from the topic at hand, I feel that this backstory is actually vital information for understanding the rhetoric of blogging, my relationship with it, and this blog in particular. Blogging isn’t some brave new experience for me. Blogging isn’t even relevant to my world, or really the world of anybody under the age of 30, anymore. Blogging is what old people do in order to adapt their understanding of dead tree formats to cyberspace. Because of this, when I blog or write anything long, I make sure to do it with a lampshade on my head and tongue in cheek. While this makes it somewhat difficult to see what I am typing, I see it as the most logical course of action when faced with the absurd. The only people who will actually be reading these sorts of posts are the people who are already in on the joke of reality, or at least possessing the potential to see that joke**. This also, hopefully, has the benefit of creating a more readable and enjoyable experience. I don’t need to pretend like I’m actually trying to do something serious that the whole world is going to judge from every angle- I’m aiming to make something that my super limited audience will be able to appreciate on more than just the surface level. Which, as I’ve said, is pretty antithetical to the concept of the modern internet.

*Odds are that most people didn’t.

**Keep reading my blog, and I’ll keep showering you with claims that you’re smarter and prettier than ordinary people.

Blog for September 25th, 2014: Miller, Swales and Nobody Else, and Hyland

So, for this week, I decided I would try something a little different than what I usually do. I’ve had a lot of thoughts on what others have posted in their blogs over the week, and rather than try to log into every system needed to address them, I’m going to work my responses into this post. That is all.

Miller
Normally, I try to cover something from every discrete topic we read about. However, for Miller, I’m pretty much going to stick with “If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” So, here are all the nice things I have to say about this piece:
1. Miller certainly seems like a perfectly nice and intelligent person. 2. This work is undeniably a landmark paper that has drastically influenced the composition landscape. 3. It is a very high-minded article. 4. It seems like the author truly believes what they’re saying.

Swales and Najjar*
I want to take the opportunity to get the most obvious response out of the way immediately: a text like this practically begs to have its own introduction rhetorically analyzed. By including a summary of the primary findings of the research in the introduction, they are is aligning themselves with the values present in the fields of hard sciences. By about 1/3^rd of the way through the article, it becomes undeniably apparent that Swales is deliberately inviting these kinds of acts of rhetorical meta-analysis. By this point, the text has spent several pages explaining the analytic style of another researcher, JP Zeppen, including listing the gaps in a particular piece of analysis on a paper by Neelakantaswamy that Zeppen included as an example. Swales specifically calls out the fact that Zeppen’s method is incapable of accounting for the fact that the Neelakantaswamy refences himself multiple times within the text in an attempt to demonstrate the value of his research over other styles while also providing room to justify further research by him. Swales immediately follows this section with the assertion that there is, in fact, a superior model for analyzing the introductions of papers- the Create A Research Space (CARS) Model. The CARS Model is, of course, a methodology that is inextricably linked with the researcher that created it- John Swales. Swales then references another paper of his, one that relies on the CARS Model for its analytic work, and explains how the model did a great job at allowing the paper to map out and assess other papers. However, obviously enough, the study found another gap in the academic research, one that can only be answered by this paper’s exploration of the inclusion of AFP (Announcement of Paper’s Findings. Swales creates within his own introduction a triple-CARS meta-layer so dense with self-referential irony that it becomes impossible to criticize or assess the topic.
This article stirred up a lot of emotions in me. I know what you’re thinking: “How could the topic of the rhetoric of research paper introductions not?” Sarcasm aside, it is the distinctions/warring ideologies of hard sciences, soft sciences and humanities that managed to tug my heartstrings in a million different directions. When I read this blog post by Aaron L, I was struck by his assertion that those in the humanities had little to no interest in science. At first, I was baffled. Science has always been way more important than literature or arbitrary arguments over meaningless abstractions- everybody knows that! Then, slowly, the weight and reality of his statements began to press on me. Now, I’ve always known that not “everybody” actually understands the fundamental truth that science matters while the humanities do not. The existence of religion is more than enough evidence to demonstrate that. However, it somehow never occurred to me that other people in the humanities actually took their topics seriously. I have always viewed the entire field of studies as an acrobatic performance, a game of gymnastics and flash. When Swales points out that the hard sciences often had AFPs and the Soft Sciences rarely did, I felt like he was almost teasing at how obvious the results were. Most psychological papers, like humanities papers, need to utilize this flashy dancing to hide the fact that there is no empirical evidence or objective platform from which their results or conclusions are derived. It is only with authors like Swales that it becomes possible to actually claim real results, as their premises are too banal to warrant violent objection. (One of the troubles with dealing with quasi-scientific work like this paper is that there are not many different lens that you can examine them from. In order to engage with them at all, you have to buy into the system that they are presenting wholesale, or you end up speaking to them on totally incompatible wavelengths. If I disagree with the assumptions that underlie this paper, I’m not arguing with the results that were obtained- I’m arguing with the CARS Model itself. I really don’t have an answer for this, it’s just something I’ve been struggling with trying to reconcile.)

Hyland
Hedging texts is for cowards. Er, which is, I, uh, mean to say that it can perhaps be a sign of a lack of confidence in your ideas when you qualify your statements too heavily. It’s clearly just my opinion, and it may be possible that hedging can be used for courageous reasons. However, it is also obvious that there is a chance that I am actually an evil alien doppleganger who has perfectly replicated and replaced the original Paul to such a degree that it would be impossible to distinguish my fiendish alien nature. Surely, it is apparent that academia is a field that doesn’t favor the bold- the word “think” is considered a strong and extremist word. I don’t really expect that it is very likely for me to have a long career in academia. It certainly seems like it’s plausible that I’m the kind of person who will take the kind of all-or-nothing stance that either rockets you to stardom or sends you spiraling downward into a unrecoverable degenerate position. Now, those of us who are reading this blog are likely to know that hedging certainly has a lot of potential benefits for getting ahead in the academy. (But are we really willing to certainly trade away our ethical integrity for theoretical benefits?) Imagine a world where a researcher could simply state their facts and ideas personally and honestly, without worrying as to whether or not they were pleasing or offending the right crowds. Now you should consider going to watch The Invention of Lying. Is it necessary to explain the idea more than I already have? I think not.
If I have understood this Hyland piece properly, and it is possible that I have not, I have created a piece of text here that is simultaneously extremely appealing and extremely repulsive to nearly every signal field of academics. I believe that it appears my work here has demonstrated that there is a possibility of further benefit to the human race in the continued development of blog posts containing experimental styles of textual presentation.

Concluding Thoughts
This is the first collection of readings for this blog that I’ve actually managed to find boring. I can’t help but feel that the authors themselves (with the possible exception of Miller) probably found the topics pretty dull. Of course, the presence of something this boring can only mean one thing- the papers and ideas are fundamental to the topic of rhetoric for academics/writing teachers. A radical and exploratory topic would never dare risk such a lack intrigue- the readers would simply wander off. Now, and I know this is a cheesy cop-out of sorts, but one thing I’ve really enjoyed about all the bloggers for this class is that everybody has been willing to inject some personality into their posts. I would read all the posts out of duty, regardless of how interesting they were. Thankfully, I’ve never had to turn to duty, because people have actually made sure that we don’t have over a dozen near identical pieces of writing to read through. I absolutely loathe classes where nobody has anything personal or new to add to the topic, and this experience has been very refreshing in that regard.

*For the sake of stylistic convenience, I am writing this section as if Swales was the the sole author. This does not mean that Najjar was not of vital importance to the production of the paper. It just means that he will be eternally forgotten, because his name came second.

Blog for September 18th, 2014- A Fond Farewell to Killingsworth

We will continue with Killingsworth this week, wrapping up the entirety of the last half of the book in this segment. I have decided to keep this introduction brief, and include my summarizing reflections at the bottom of the post.

Chapter Six: Appeals to Body

In the previous post, I expressed some disappointment in the fact that this textbook was not more modern. This chapter sparked that feeling yet again. It is clear that Killingsworth had no clue what the future of the internet was going to be. His descriptions of appeals to body and place are magnificent- for mass media cultures and situations. The advertising model that he presents is purely an example of the world of yesteryear. In Killingsworth’s description of advertising, the advertiser is modeled as somebody aiming for universal penetration in high viewership programs and situations. However, in today’s economic climate, the advertising model has largely shifted away from “Network” advertising, instead choosing to favor targeted ads. The single biggest ad agency in the nation is a certain Bay Area tech company, and the secret to their advertising model is that they offer hyper-specific analytic information for every possible consumer market. The universal appeal of the appeal to generic body desires has become somewhat unnecessary in the face of this new model of advertising that now exists and proliferates. Of course, the general notion of an appeal to body still applies fully- humans are still corporeal creatures with an overweening obsession to maximize their physical state. However, whereas advertisers may have originally said “Don’t you want to have washboard abs?” to everyone, they now may instead say to me “One easy trick to increase your bench press” or some such nonsense, and “Best places for sub dermal piercings in the Bay” for somebody else. The idea of a universally appealing body is no longer universally appealing.
Of course, for the most part, good health of the body is still universally appealing, too, but even then, the method of appeal is often different. Again, I might get an empirically-based ad for a new type of apnea prevention system, while somebody else in the Bay might get an ad for woo-based homeopathic placebo.

Chapter Seven: Appeals to Gender

For the sake of my health and sanity, I now abstain from talking on this issue unless actively forced to. Safe to say, there is a lot of politicking and argumentation around the nature of gender and appealing to it.

Chapter Eight: Appeals to Race (Aka: Appeals to Literacy)

When I first looked at the length of chapter eight, I was somewhat shocked. As much as I appreciate the value of race relations and studies, I couldn’t think a reason as to why race would be the longest chapter of a book based on outlining basic ideas of rhetoric. Of course, as evident from my modified title, the chapter is actually two chapters with overlapping content. Although race is clearly the central focus of the chapter, race is explore primarily through the notion of literacy. I am reducing this down to extremely simple concepts here, but, basically speaking, your race is more representative of the cultural background and literacy you have than it is a reflection of your skin color. Somebody who is unable to assimilate and imitate the culture around them is going to suffer from stigmatization and complications in communication. This lack of literacy of a culture is costing them, due to their rhetorical ignorance, whereas an individual who modifies their style to placate the others is using rhetoric to their advantage perfectly. This brings up a lot of potential questions and complications regarding racial identity and cultures, but this is probably not the place for that.

Chapter Nine: Appeal Through Tropes

As part of my dedicated effort to include as many tangential topics as possible in these postings, I would like to take the opportunity to mention one of the more entertaining abstracted wikis on the internet- TV Tropes. Massively informal and often totally idiotic in many ways, TV Tropes is also a fantastic repository for understanding the popular trophic movements in most forms of entertainment and popular culture. Since the terminology used by the site is often satirical, self-referential and somewhat arbitrary, it fails to even serve as a dictionary service. However, as you will note if you go to visit the site, it is still an indispensable treasure trove of information regarding coming to understand the actual acts and moves that an author makes. Perhaps another way to describe it- imagine that a schizophrenic court jester was tasked with creating a comprehensive breakdown of all the tropes and rhetorical moves that a creator could possibly use in their work. A magnificent companion for this chapter, and somewhat less esoteric than awful equal sign examples he tried to give.

Chapter Ten: The Appeal of Narrative

I like to think of myself as a writer. I write a lot of narratives, and I’ve always struggled to understand why I bother. This chapter helped me to understand some of the reasonings behind it. I’m not actually entirely happy with the answer I found for myself. It appears that, more or less, I’m drawn to narrative formats because of the way that they better allow you to gratify your own ego. Even though empirical knowledge is far more valuable for accuracy, narratives are what compel the masses.

Concluding Thoughts:

As I wrapped up reading the final chapter of the book, only one sentence stuck in my mind- “What on Earth did I just read?” Killingsworth has absolutely produced a text that is truly intriguing and unique. It is a product of a certain time, place, and person, and becomes more than just a textbook. As should be obvious from my prior allusions, Killingsworth does not simply produce the text- he occupies it. His personality, his tastes, his ideals and his failings are all weaved directly into the information we are presented with. I’m not sure that it’s an ethical choice for a textbook writer. However, despite my uncertainty regarding this ethical dilemma, I’m satisfied with the product I was offered. The problem I have is that I’m not sure whether or not others should be satisfied with what was offered. What Killingsworth presents here is something of a bait-and-switch-and-also-keep-the-first-thing-too. The product offers everything that it seems to advertise- it is absolutely a mid-upper college level textbook that comprehensively covers the basics of modern rhetoric a la 2005. However, the question becomes- does Killingsworth’s styling offer added value, or is it just a bloated way of foisting ideology on readers? Personally, I’m inclined to side with the notion that he has no responsibility to curtail such editorializing- but I’m still really not sure.

Blog for September 11th, 2014- Never Forget, The Matrix, and a smidgen of Killingsworth

We now turn to Appeals in Modern Rhetoric: An Ordinary Language Approach by M. Jimmie Killingsworth*.

Prelude/Chapter One: A General Introduction into Rhetorical Appeals

It is interesting that Killingsworth so strongly works to paint this text as an “ordinary language approach”. It is interesting, however, only because of how clearly he fails at this attempt. Although far more relatable than your average academic textbook, the language contained in the book is still fairly beyond what I see your average person interacting with. Thinking back to my undergrad days, I knew very few people who would find this book tolerably simple. Outside of the university system, most people I know would barely be able to read the book. I’ve been accused of being deliberately complicated when writing stuff that is far simpler than what this book manages to achieve. That said, I’m really enjoying what I have read, and appreciate the text for what it is. It absolutely is far more approachable than your standard academic texts, and Killingsworth has succeeded in keeping me engrossed in the topic.

As a quick refresher to those who may have forgotten- this segment of the book functions as an outline of the topics that will come later in the book, and also serves as the skeleton framework onto which these later ideas will be affixed. He centers the whole thing around the notion of “rhetorical appeals”, which, as far as I can tell, is his way of framing the “ensuring cooperation” terminology that seems to be redefined in every text on rhetoric that I’ve read so far**. These appeals are defined by three key factors- the position of the author, the position of the audience, and the values that are being balanced. Fairly standard stuff, but essential to the basics, and does a good job of outlining Killingsworth’s personal style and values.

On a somewhat more personal level, the text had a heavy appeal to me, in that Killingsworth seems to be the same kind of geek/nerd that I am. It was actually difficult for me to remain objective and critical in this write-up- I was already overly excited once I saw that he used Neuromancer as a reference text. Often times, academics claiming to be fans of science-fiction really mean “I saw The Matrix once”. Although only a brief name-drop, including a Gibson reference won me over as a reader.

(If you are just here for the rhetorical analysis, feel free to skip this next segment. It’s relevant, but long and not essential, seeing as it’s mostly about the rhetorical complications present in a movie discussed in the book.)

Of course, that Matrix sentence above was not arbitrary- Killingsworth devotes a few pages to analyzing it as an example of both a rhetorical appeal, and a sort of “meta” rhetorical appeal. It is an acceptable write-up, and I can’t fault him for what he wrote (especially seeing as this is a rhetorical textbook). However, as somebody with an unhealthy obsession with such topics, I feel it can’t hurt to offer some correction/commentaries on the analysis that Killingsworth provides. He describes the Matrix itself as a human battery farm for machines, where our metabolisms are used to produce to energy for the machinery. However, a quick reflection on thermodynamics would demonstrate why this makes no sense. Any system capable of feeding and maintaining human life would require a greater energy expenditure than the human body would be capable of putting out. In addition, even if the machines were somehow utterly incapable of developing solar panels or processes for plant conversions, humans would be the absolute worst creatures to use for bio-batteries. Humans have horrifically poor metabolic conservation abilities, and, as demonstrated in the film, have a tendency to engage in violence and rebellions fairly regularly. Instead, as a perusal of the full canon will reveal, the Matrix exists as a system unto itself. In The Animatrix, it is revealed that humans originally built sentient machines, and then immediately declared war on them in a rash wave of technophobia. Although a mass genocide against the machines almost succeeded, the robots would go on to win the war and gain control over the world’s infrastructure. Left with millions of prisoners-of-war who wanted them destroyed at all costs, the machines were faced with a complex ethical dilemma- recreate the bloody history of their creators, or attempt to find a solution to peacefully deal with such bloodthirsty creatures. They do manage to come up with a peaceful solution to the problem- The Matrix 1.0. Now, to tie this back into the concept of rhetoric, Marix 1.0 was a perfect world without flaws. Lacking a sense of malice, the machines attempted placate the human aggression with a paradise that would eliminate the need for further conflict. The Matrix 1.0 was completely destroyed when humanity roundly rejected the entire notion.  The series centers around the choice between accepting lies in exchange for comfort, or accepting the truth at great personal expense. Killingsworth overlooks that Zion is not purely a pleasant place, but also a place tempered by a heft amount of suffering and struggle. As a further thought, I experienced a mild sense of disappointment when I had finished the segment having not found anything on the directors/writers of the Matrix films***.

(Matrix talk ends here.)

Chapter Two: Appeals to Authority and Evidence

This is an interesting chapter, in that Killingsworth first establishes the idea of incontrovertible truth through absolute authority, and then goes on to spend the entire chapter destroying the notion that such a truth could ever be established in the modern rhetorical landscape. No data collection process is comprehensive enough to avoid being countered by another argument****.

Chapter Three: Rhetorical Situations

I appreciate the way that Killingsworth makes it clear that all rhetorical situations necessarily interact with ethos, pathos, and logos simultaneously. Because we went over the topic in class and in Bitzer, I already had a decent understanding of the situation, but there is always a tingle of satisfaction when texts and themes overlap. Although I find myself agreeing with the author (perhaps too much), I could see how Killingsworth’s rhetorical relativism could be a provocative/contentious idea for a lot of people. The one thing that saves this from being an inadvisable tact is the way that he continues to turn the conversation around to the idea that all of these relativistic notions are not a matter of defining reality, but instead a way of engaging in effective rhetorical discourse. I personally find the idea of teaching a course without engaging in these ideas abhorrent, so I appreciate seeing a way to “slide” certain controversial options by through the defense of a “framework” system that everything yields to.

Chapter Four: Appeals to Time

Time is a very simple concept. The past was better/the past was worse. The present is now. The future will be better/the future will be worse. Due to our apparent sequential chrono-specificity, all appeals to time will inevitably fall into one of those categories. And, yep, that’s pretty much what the whole chapter comes down to. He includes a tangential segment about how modern society is concerned with the notion of modernity, but all in all, it’s not a particularly complicated category to cover. There are more than enough examples of temporal appeals included, to the point of feeling perhaps more comprehensive than it needed to be here.

Chapter Five: Appeals to Place

Well, I have to admit that this chapter did not go in the direction that I expected it to. I figured he would go for something simple and obvious, like patriotism and the idea of international conflict. Instead, he went straight into Native American rhetoric on place. I can’t help but feel that he takes things too far here, and loses sight of the audience. I excused his failings at creating an ordinary-language approach to the discussion, because he kept things at least somewhat accessible and approachable to the general population. However, I’m not exactly sure who the target audience for this chapter is supposed to be. It is so much more abstracted and ideologically loaded than the other chapters that it becomes difficult to extricate the explanations from his perceptions and examples. 

* The “M.” doesn’t appear to stand for anything.

** Interestingly enough, I found this to be the most frustrating and complicated part of this segment. Killingsworth ties up the explanation in a bizarre nautical metaphor that never quite seems to connect. His real world examples have far more impact and heft than the forced metaphor does.

*** It was only after careful consideration that I realized it would have been chronologically impossible for this topic to come up in the book. Knowledge of these events was only made public in 2008. At the time the films were made, the popular tagline was “a film by the Wachowski Brothers”, seeing as the filmmakers were Larry and Andy Wachowski. However, roughly around the time that the Matrix sequels were being made, “Larry” Wachowski was transitioning into a life as Lana Wachowski. In addition to making Lana (as far as my research could find) the only openly transgender major motion film director, the notion adds a new dimension to the identity and release rhetorics related to the film.

****The solipsists would probably like to have a word with Killingsworth. Provided he’s not just a construct of their minds, of course.

Blog for September 4th, 2014- Lindemann, Bazermann and Bitzer

Lindemann, Bazerman, and Bitzer do not explicitly cover much in the way of similar content. Although all three pieces are on the matter of rhetoric, the central proposed focus of their texts vary enough as to be considered discrete. Interestingly enough, the three pieces loosely cover three different ideological fields regarding the discussion of a topic. Lindemann attempts to represent the “objective” information surrounding rhetoric, presenting an overview of the historical discussion surrounding rhetoric and its practice. Bazerman could be seen as attempting to cover the “practical”, giving the reader a look into the actual concrete rhetorical moves that are used, how to detect them, and what they are used for. Finally, Bitzer presents something a bit more specific, choosing to zero in on the concept of a rhetorical situation, and exploring it thoroughly. Because of these disparate styles/topics, I’ve not made an effort to integrate my assessments/analysis of these pieces, and have instead decided to simply provide sequential brief write-ups of my thoughts on each.

Lindemann’s “What Do Teachers Need to Know about Rhetoric?”-

Lindemann presents five general assumptions regarding the nature of rhetoric. However, these “assumptions” are far from natural concepts derived from any inherent meaning in the topic, but instead demonstrate the author’s own ideological conceits. I would find such behavior logical, if this book and its assumptions were presented as a rhetorical piece. With academic textbooks, an author is instead expected to present situations as objectively and neutrally as is possible. (There are, of course, a number of texts that deliberately subvert this notion, such as the sublime “A People’s History of the United States”. However, these types of works are inevitably marked by their colorful titles and unique executions. In the case of Lindemann’s piece, we are given a dry textbook and no indication that the work is going to be so clearly ideologically loaded.)

"3. When we practice rhetoric, we use language, either spoken or written, to "induce cooperation" in an audience.” (This is one of Lindemann’s key contentions, and appears multiple times throughout, and not just in the five assumption list.)

I find this to be somewhat of a manipulative usage of terminology. “Cooperation” has a fairly positive connotation in general English discourse, so it is clear here that Lindemann is using the term in order to emphasize the positive aspects of rhetorical communication. However, the only way this definition truly works is if “inducing cooperation” is used in the loosest of possible interpretations, relying on a meaning more along the lines of “induce an action”. For example, say I were to use rhetoric in order to cause a fight between two parties, a fight in which I have no vested interest beyond the violence induced. In this situation, the only cooperation being induced is the manipulation of the parties in line with my desire for violence. Although this is technically still a form of cooperating, it feels disingenuous to emphasize such colored terminology when more neutral options exist.

"4. The purpose of rhetoric, inducing cooperation, involves more than mere persuasion, narrowly defined. Discourse that affects an audience, that informs, moves, delights, and teaches, has a rhetorical aim. Not all verbal or written communication aims to create an effect in an audience; the brief exchanges between people engaged in informal conversation usually do not have a rhetorical purpose.”

I’m of the opinion that every discourse and discourse format is a political choice. Although I believe in remaining as neutral as possible in informative texts, it is impossible to actually remain fully neutral. Let us assume a brief exchange between people in an informal conversation. Here is one example:

Person A: Hello. Nice day, isn’t it?

Person B: Go to hell.

Or

Person A: Hello. Nice day, isn’t it?

Person B: Hello. Yes. Have a nice day.

In both cases, despite being short, informal conversations that Lindemann describes as having no rhetorical value, it is obvious that major rhetorical decisions regarding the social contract and interpersonal relationships are being made by both person A and B in both scenarios. This is actually one spot where it’s possible to bring in the other authors- Bitzer’s assessment seems to agree with me here, as when he describes the rhetorical situation of a group of fisherman who avoid using anything but the most primitive and basic language. Communication is rhetorical, because all moments of human interaction invite a rhetorical situation.

“5. …However, the notion of choice carries with it an important ethical responsibility. Our strategies must be reasonable and honest.”

I am utterly baffled by Lindemann’s inclusion of this assumption. It not only fails standards of common sense, it contradicts the text itself. There are examples throughout of times where rhetoric was demonized for its ability to be used towards insincere/unreasonable ends. Rhetoric is purely neutral.

Bazerman’s “Analyzing the Author’s Purpose and Technique”-

As I already mentioned, Bazerman’s piece is a look at the practical tools that go into analyzing rhetoric, attempting to teach the reader how to do so for themselves. To avoid rehashing the lessons contained, I figured it would be more interesting to instead do a bit of rhetorical analysis of Bazerman’s choices of examples, which I found fairly interesting. For, you see, although masquerading as a textual aid, Bazerman’s text is actually nothing more than liberal communist propaganda designed to indoctrinate the youth. He begins by using Senator Joe McCarthy as an example of rhetorical manipulation, and goes on to denigrate the American patriot by painting the Senator’s actions as an example of the dangers of such behavior. This later transitions into a short transcript of the campaign speeches of George Bush, Ross Perot, and Bill Clinton. Bazerman plays up Clinton’s rhetorical (and populist) moves as being benign and beneficial, while Bush and Perot are depicted as aggressive and fear-mongering. Oddly enough, this same fear-mongering isn’t called out in last major textual example he provides- an article regarding environmental conservation efforts, written in a government-produced propaganda magazine. This article takes up multiple pages of the Bazerman piece, and is immediately followed by a set of rhetorical analysis that describes the motivations of the piece, while also praising all the good that these actions enable. Despite being completely irrelevant to the ostensible actual topic of the piece, Bazerman can’t help but load the piece with socialist propaganda. Even the final example of a student rhetorical analysis paper is about resisting corporations and leaders, and placing the “power” back in the hands of the people.

Bitzer’s “The Rhetorical Situation”-

I actually had the most difficulty understanding this piece, so I figured I would focus on more a “summary”-style write-up than the other two pieces. From what I understood of the piece, he’s attempting to outline the factors that influence a person’s rhetorical moves. These factors, “the rhetorical situation”, are compromised of exigence, audience, and constraints. Personally, I saw all of these factors as constraints, but Bitzer seemed to consider constraints in a more abstract sense- such as the person’s ideology or background knowledge. Other than simply repeating the rest of the article, it feels difficult to say more.

Final Deep, Thought-Provoking Questions-

• How do you reconcile the desire for objectivity through neutrality with the ubiquity of opportunities for rhetorical movements? Every attempt seems to fall flat, and even Bitzer’s drier piece still contains some questionable terminology and jabs at other cultures.
• Do we even have any obligation towards objectivity or neutrality in our teaching of rhetoric? Is responsibility purely subjective?