Rhetoric of Blogging

As an update to my former blogging-rhetoric posts, I believe that the audience of my blogs has changed over the course of the semester.  Initially, I tried to balance between writing for my future students, my future self, my teacher, and my colleagues.  However, now I only post blogs meant for my teacher to read, and I only post blog comments for my peer to read.  This change has happened for a couple of reasons.  First, I do not find the material in this course to be as relevant to my future needs as I originally thought.  Thus, I do not need to write to my future self or my future students.  Next, viewing the number of times my blog has been viewed by classmates throughout the semester has affected who I write to.  Since I am relatively far down on the blog list, I am victim to what is known as voter's fatigue.  This is the theory that people are likely to choose someone (vote for someone) near the top of a list than at the bottom.  Similarly, classmates, when choosing who to blog to, are less likely to respond to someone's blog at the bottom of the list.  Hence, not a lot of classmates have visited my blog.  Thus, through collecting and reviewing this data throughout the semester, I have decided to not address my blog posts to my classmates.  As a result, my only audience is my teacher.  It is interesting how the number of audiences a speaker has to take into account can change over a small period.

I only post blog comments for my peers to read because they are the most likely person to read my comments.  While a student most likely has an email sent to them for every comment, I doubt that the teacher would read every comment, particularly since he does not receive any notification of when a comment is created.  Overall, I learned that the rhetoric of blogging can change over time based on new information and findings. 

Crosswhite - The Final Chapter

In the last and final chapter of The Rhetoric of Reason, James Crosswhite argues that writers who commit multiple errors should focus on "cognitively demanding and purposeful writing tasks" rather than grammar instruction (273).  He presents three important points to emphasize his argument.  First, if students with grammar-issues do not receive cognitively demanding tasks, then they are falling behind in intellectual development comparative to students with no grammar-issues.  Second, he argues that focusing on grammar will incentivize students to believe that good writing is grammatically correct writing while actual good writing is more ideas based.  Third, he cites multiple studies that reveal how grammar instruction actually has a little-to-no or even negative impact on student writing.

Crosswhite's observations make me wonder as to whether a curriculum can be designed that incorporates cognitively demanding tasks with grammar instruction.  For example, what this might look like would include cognitively demanding writing tasks with grammar mini-lessons.  These topics would be revisited throughout the semester so that it would increase student recollection rates.  In addition, the writing tasks would later be used as samples to teach the grammar taught in the mini-lesson.  In this manner, grammar instruction could be incorporated into cognitively demanding writing tasks.  Although Crosswhite cites studies that show grammar instruction has little, if any benefit to students, I wonder if grammar instruction combined with cognitively-demanding tasks would produce a significant improvement in grammar for students that would have participated in such a curriculum.  This would avoid having grammar students believe that good writing is synonymous with good editing since the cognitively demanding task is part of the assessment process which would re-emphasize the role of ideas in strong writing. 

I liked Crosswhite's suggestion that students should communicate with one another as well as communicate with outside audiences.  It is also the responsibility of the instructor to develop these assignments.  I found it interesting that he suggests that the class tackle issues that are not familiar to them because they will be less likely to change their mind in addition to ignoring the learning process.  And finally, such questions should be open ended in nature to allow for the expression of different perspectives.

College English Articles

In David Wallace's article "Unwelcome Stories, Identity Matters, and Strategies for Engaging in Cross-Boundary Discourses," the author argues that the identity of both the writer AND the reader matters, and that no matter what people will write about, they will always cross a boundary.  Similar to the concept that all writing is political according to Paulo Friere, Wallace argues that all writing crosses boundaries.  Thus, writing, by its very nature, is inherently offensive.  There is not one piece of writing that will not offend someone in the world.  Thus, people must learn to interact and engage with those they do not agree with.

However, I found Matthew Heard's article "Repositioning Curriculum Design: Broadening the Who and How of Curricular Invention" to be more interesting.  Heard argues that simplified curriculum design stagnates student thinking and engagement.  Instead, he advocates that instructors should design curriculum around open-ended questions about the real world; ideally, this is a field that students can participate and contribute in.  He centers around the notions of creativity and inquiry; students should be expected to think creatively about real-life issues and ask thought-provoking questions.  I am glad that Heard addresses the "culture of assessment" that dominates education (especially high school: SAT, PSAT, AP, ACT, CAHSEE, District Benchmarks, CELDT, and Grading Periods).  His concern is that such open-ended questions and creativity don't lend themselves too well to traditional forms of assessment (328).  However, I believe that instructors could use the "Bloom's Taxonomy of Higher Order Thinking" to rank students.  For example, if students ask higher order questions, then they should receive a higher grade.  It could be argued that developing higher order questions also requires a certain degree of creativity.  Overall, I agree with Heard that curricula should be meaningful and centered around inquiry and creativity.  However, how would you design a mode of inquiry that all students would want to participate in?  For example, I would not want to participate in an inquiry about which are the best tires for my car, but I might find the inquiry fascinating if I was a car guy or amateur mechanic.  Thus, inquiries run the risk of alienating individual students.  However, if the course is designed so that everyone can choose their own topic, then there is a limited opportunity for collaboration since every body's topic is unique.  Heard does not address whether inquiry topics should be set or unique to the individual, only that they should be open-ended.  Although, the examples he uses of previous inquiry topics all appear to be pre-determined by the instructor.  Thus, this is another area that needs further exploration and/or elaboration.  All in all, Heard makes some interesting points, and I hope that teachers as well as districts will attempt to implement his suggestions for curriculum design.

Crosswhite - Introduction; Chapter 1

In James Crosswhite's book, The Rhetoric of Reason, he begins with an attempt to reconcile rhetoric with postmodernism.   A large portion of postmodern philosophies focus on the limitations of language and its inherent inability to arrive at any ultimate truth.  Hence, this inability has given rise to infamous phrase: the end of philosophy.  Although some interpret postmodernism as depressing given its stance on absolute truth, others find it freeing.  However, linguistic philosophers from Wittgenstein to Derrida acknowledge the ability of language to increase one's knowledge and understanding; in other words, although we cannot achieve an ultimate truth, we can achieve some semblance of it.  Crosswhite reframes the subject of rhetoric into the background of postmodernism.  He addresses those who believe that we should give up any attempt at obtaining truth through language.  He also addresses skeptics who refuse to acknowledge the findings of postmodernism; on page 30, he imagines a scenario where a philosopher quibbles over whether a couple is married or not.  This points to the heart of philosophy: is philosophy helpful in a practical, ordinary sense?  Crosswhite's answer would be yes: though rhetoric.  Rhetoric is where philosophy and the ordinary converge according to Crosswhite.  Argumentation is at the heart of both philosophy and real-world experiences, and it is with argumentation that Crosswhite lays the foundation for the rest of his book. 

The Rhetoric of Blogging

When blogging about rhetoric, it forces the author to reflect on his or her own use of rhetoric.  For instance, I must always ask myself: what is the exigence for my writing?  In other words, what prompts my writing?  The class schedule requires that I perform a weekly blog post, and if it wasn't for my desire to earn a good grade in this class, I would not write these posts.  Hence, the exigence is the class requirement combined with my determination to earn a high grade.  In addition, this is an extension of my determination to earn a Master's degree; I want to learn about the art of teaching writing so that I can better serve my students.  The more my students will learn, the better society and future generations will be.  Thus, in a way, the exigence for my blogs stems from my desire to see a better and brighter future.
Another question I constantly ask myself is: who is my audience, and what is my purpose for writing to them?  At times, I write for my teacher.  Other times, I write for future employers that may look upon my writing.  In addition, I write for myself so that I may be able to look upon these blog posts in the future and refresh my memories.  And finally, I write so that my future students can visit my blog and read my reflections on rhetoric.  Trying to juggle these different audiences can be difficult and even contradictory.  For instance, what I write as a reminder to myself in the future may not be the same thing I would write to a prospective employer.  These different audiences forces me to write as different speakers.
Because I write for four audiences, I have to code-switch between the way I write.  For example, if I write for my teacher, I write in a more formal, academic tone.  When I write for myself, I write using a shorthand that I would be able to understand: self-comprehension would be my main focus.  When writing for future students, I write as an authority figure disseminating information on rhetoric.  And finally, when I write to prospective employers, I write very formally as an authority figure using academic language and focusing on theoretical rather than practical applications. 
The depth of my exigency and the constant shifting of audience provide an overview of my rhetorical process while blogging.  The speaker and audience is in constant flux while the exigency remains the same.  The purpose may change, but the motivation doesn't.  This may lead to a disjunction among my blog posts as one may be informal and shorthand while another may be formal and employ copious amounts of academic language.  Overall, I try to produce the best writing I can regardless of which audience I am primarily writing for.

Arguing in print, online, and face-to-face

In Theresa Enos and Shane Borrowman’s article “Authority and Credibility,” the authors synthesize the classical definitions of ethos with the emerging importance of online sources.  This article inspired me to create an activity based on their assertion that “students often intuitively work through issues of credibility.  They know, for example, that Time is a better source than The Daily Wildcat…They know that neither is as good as an article from a scholarly journal or new anthology published by a university press” (107).  The activity is an introduction to ethos, and it begins with the class brainstorming different sources of getting news.  After a student finishes writing all of the different types of sources on the board, students will get into groups and arrange the list in order of least credible to most credible news sources on the board.  Afterwards, we will debrief on the lists and discuss the role and importance of credibility in developing an argument.

Gesa E. Kirsch and Jacqueline J. Royster’s article “Feminist Rhetorical Practices: In Search of Excellence” inspired me to have students write a reflection throughout their papers.  It was refreshing to have the author write their reflection as I read because it offered me an insight on the author’s thought process.  This reflection will help students become even more conscious of their writing process through reflecting on their writing and thinking-process.  In this manner, a writing assignment can turn into a meta-writing assignment where students reflect on their writing process.

 Bo Wang’s article “Engaging Nuquanzhuyi: The Making of a Chinese Feminist Rhetoric” was a little disappointing.  It was refreshing to step into the point of view of a marginalized group of people, but the subject-matter was a little out of touch with contemporary feminist theory in China due to the fact that the author chose to focus on feminist writings from the early twentieth century.  With the scarcity of women in China, women have gained more power.  It would have been interesting to see how the significant gender imbalance in China has contributed to the female perspective on rhetoric.  In this manner, the article was slightly disappointing.

My favorite reading this week, Brian Jackson and Jon Wallin’s “Rediscovering the ‘Back-and-Forthness’ of Rhetoric in the Age of YouTube,” focused on the difference between arguing in an academic paper, arguing online, and arguing in face-to-face scenarios.  The article argues that although academic institutions are great at having students produce argumentative writing, they are neglecting the equally if not more, important medium of arguing online and face-to-face.  Coming from a high school teacher’s perspective, the common core standards require that students collaborate and argue with each other throughout their high school career.  However, it is rare that teachers require students to argue online.  Although it is a rough outline, I believe that teachers can design activities that require students to either write blog responses to other students’ blogs they disagree with or require students to make an argument to a real-world organization in the community.  These activities would help empower students’ voice and provide a meaningful learning opportunity respectively.  Overall, these readings helped me develop three in-class activities that will help my students understand and employ rhetoric better. 

How much should you know about me?

I found Stephanie Kerschbaum’s article “On Rhetorical Agency and Disclosing Disability in Academic Writing” fascinating.  Like the Kerschbaum, I was offended how people (some close and some not so close to the author) suggest that she mentions her disability in her writing.  It challenges the notion that the writing is adequate on its own.  It also calls special attention to those writing about people with special needs.  For example, authors in African-American studies don’t have to reveal whether or not they are black, authors of violence of against women texts don’t have to reveal whether or not they were domestically or sexually assaulted, and authors writing about gender don’t have to reveal which gender they more associate with.  This resonates with her declaration that, “Why am I always asked to talk about my deafness?  Why not about my race or my gender or sexuality?  Nobody has ever said to me, ‘So how does your gender play into this theory?’” (67).  However, Kerschbaum relates how writers of disability studies face direct or indirect pressure to reveal either their specific disability or their relative with a disability.  This is definitely a form of discrimination in the academic world.

I found it fascinating that Kerschbaum comes to the realization amid her academic career that revealing or not revealing one’s disability in their writing is a strategic choice on the author’s part.  I also found the following claim and rationale intriguing, “Because disability is a contested site upon which identity claims are made…disability self-disclosures are a prime location where academic writers assert themselves and give texture to their identity claims” (61).  Kerschbaum makes the claim that disability is so intertwined with one’s identity that it would be difficult to separate the disability from the person.  I don’t know how much I agree with that claim.  However, she simultaneously mentions how the acknowledgement of one’s disability is a form of empowerment that can act as a sort of membership in a particular subset of the academic community.  In other words, claiming one’s identity could be empowering or demeaning depending on how the author perceives it.

Claiming one’s disability can also backfire.  Kerschbaum mentions how an audience could understand the writing as a self-empowering piece where the only praise the author receives is that he or she is “brave” for writing about their disability.  I love how Kerschbaum then makes the academic distinction between the body and the mind, and when should the body come in in topics of the mind?  Kerschbaum’s writing begs the question as to how much the audience should know about the person who wrote an article and why should it matter?  What is salient and not salient to disclose?  And, how can we make that distinction?  Her article forces us, as readers, to evaluate how much of ourselves we disclose in our writing as well as why we do or do not do it.  It also calls into questions how much of an author do you need to understand before you read their article.  The ideas, questions, and struggles in this article will stay with me for a long time.

Topic and Preliminary Bibliography for Final Project

Topic: How can rhetoric be incorporated into portfolio design?

 

Elbow, Peter and Pat Belanoff.  “Portfolios as a Substitute for Proficiency Examinations.”  College Composition and Communication 37.3 (1986): 336-339.  Print.

Elbow, Peter.  “Ranking, Evaluating, and Liking: Sorting Out Three Forms of Judgment.”  College English 55.2 (1993): 187-206.  Print.

Guthrie, John T. and Allan Wigfield.  “Engagement and Motivation in Reading.”  Handbook of Reading Research.  Eds. Kamil, Michael L., Peter Mosenthal, et al.  Mahwah: LEA, 2000.  403-422.  Print.

Lombard, Judy.  “To Portfolio or Not to Portfolio: Helpful or Hyped?”  College Teaching 56.1 (2008): 7-10.  Print.

Neff-Lippman, Julie.  “Assessing Writing.”  Concepts in Composition: Theory and Practice in the Teaching of Writing.  Ed. Clark, Irene L.  New York: Routledge, 2012.  145-167.  Print.

Nitko, Anthony J. and Susan M. Brookhart.  Educational Assessment of Students.  New Jersey: Pearson, 2007.  Print.

 “Writing Assessment: A Position Statement.”  Conference on College Composition and Communication.  NCTE, 2006.  Web.  12 July 2014.

Yancey, Kathleen B.  “Looking Back as We Look Forward: Historicizing Writing Assessment as a Rhetorical Act.”  CCC 50.3 (1999): 483-503.  Print.

Yancey, Kathleen B. “Made Not Only in Words: Composition in a New Key.”  CCC 56.2 (2004): 297-328.  Print.

What should teachers teach, and how should they grade when it comes to organization?

In Victor Villanueva Jr.’s article “Maybe a Colony: And Still Another Critique of the Comp Community,” he develops an analogy between the United States’ colonization of Puerto Rico with the Eurocentric “colonization” of composition.  For example, latina and latino culture value repetition, poetic diction, and apparent digressions from the dominant line of reasoning (Villanueva 184).  However, due to the high status of Eurocentric principals in composition theory, these techniques are considered improper tools to include in a composition class.  This astute observation begs the question: if there should not be a single organizational form to composing essays, what should the teacher teach in terms of organization?  On the one hand, should the teacher include multiple forms and have students decide on which forms and/or combination of forms they wish to use?  Keep in mind, it will take extra time for students to learn new organizational methods as well as to practice and employ them.  On the other hand, teachers could make vague suggestions when it comes to teaching organization and allow students to express themselves as they see fit.  This conundrum doesn’t merely affect what teachers teach in terms of organization, but it also affects how teachers grade.  Should teachers factor the category of organization in determining a student’s grade?  Should organization be graded on a binary or sliding scale?  In other words, do students either have it or they don’t, or do students have more or less organization in their writing?  If so, is the teacher required to learn all of the possible forms of accepted organization in writing such as appropriate essay organization in Ethiopia, Crete, Norway, Greenland, and Russia?  Although I agree with Villanueva’s assertion that teachers should not teach only one form of organization, it opens a Pandora’s box as to what organizational techniques (if any) the teacher should teach as well as how the teacher should (if at all) grade students on the organization of their ideas.  These are important as well as practical questions that Villanueva fails to address in his article.   

Blog Rhetoric Reflection

Blogging is a diverse form of writing.  While genres such as academic writing, mystery novels, and biography all follow more or less specific genre conventions, the blog genre follows considerably less so.  For example, blog audiences are determined more by subject matter than any other factor.  This means that a blog can be casual, semi-formal, or formal (even academic) in its content.  In addition, it can be supported by copious amounts of evidence or no evidence at all.  In addition, bloggers can incorporate as much or as less multimedia as they desire.  And here's the kicker: all of the above are allowed in a blog.  It is no wonder why when students are required to write a blog for a class that there are always numerous questions about blog content, style, and expectations.  "Did I do this right?"  "Is this what you're looking for?"  It is a genre with such a wide range of possibilities that students need boundaries to help focus their writing.  With more freedom comes more frustration, and in that way, the blogging genre mirrors the human condition: the more choices we have, the less satisfied we are in our actions.

Stance and Engagement

Out of all three articles assigned for reading this week, Hyland's "Stance and Engagement" article was the most enlightening and practical.  I found the notion that academic writers should not only position themselves within a topic but also within other writers on that topic to be a well-made point. In addition, the concepts of stance and engagement were easy to understand and easy to apply.  I noticed that Hyland's structure and voice organized his ideas and communicated them well respectively.  His use of multiple examples helped to clarify some of the more difficult ideas of the text.  

As a high school teacher, I instantly thought about Bloom's taxonomy while reading this article.  I felt that the two articles would compliment each other in order to help students improve their writing.  While Bloom would help students develop their ideas, I believe that Hyland would help them position themselves in an argument and interact with the audience.  A position paper or research paper would be an ideal assignment to have students learn about different points of view on a topic; students could then use the concepts of stance and engagement to position themselves and interact with the reader.  Peer review sessions could also incorporate reader response questions where the student evaluates another student's level of engagement through the text.  This would help develop audience awareness in students.  However, I would eliminate the category of "personal asides" for students because I find it to be a difficult concept to grasp that may confuse rather than help.  Otherwise, I plan on using this article in the classroom to help students participate in an academic conversation, develop their voice, and develop their audience awareness.

In John Swales and Hazem Najjar's article "The Writing of Research Article Introductions," they discuss the archetypal structure of research articles.  Having read many of Swales's articles previously including another article (aside: or maybe the same one) on research article introduction last semester, the article was more of a review than enlightening.  This is not to say that the article is not useful.  I find this article to be extremely useful, but to a select audience.  For example, I would only expose high school seniors to writing of this caliber.  This is not because of the level of language the authors employ, but rather, the content of the subject matter.  Although I would love to incorporate this article in a sophomore or junior English class, being a first year teacher, I don't believe I have the capabilities at the moment to incorporate it successfully into a research unit.  This is not to say I wouldn't use it in the near-future.

In Miller's article "Genre as Social Action," his diction and clunky voice repeatedly distracted me from absorbing the content.  For example, he uses words such as "ethnomethodological" and "ontological status of situations."  As a reader, there is a lot of stop and go which hinders from the absorption of the author's message since readers can only store around 120 wpm in their short-term memory to process in their long-term memory.  Hence, the reader must constantly re-read in order to understand the author's point.  This article made me appreciate Hyland's voice even more, and I may consider using this article as an example of voice and audience awareness for my students.

Rhetorical Analysis #1

Rhetorical Analysis 1: For this brief analysis, you will choose your own example of the kinds of texts we have examined together and apply the tools you have learned to identify the purposes and audiences of that text and explain the ways that the author attempts to accomplish those purposes.

Text: “Please Don’t Feed the Bears” by Paul Rogers in the San Jose Mercury News 9/14/2014

Audience: The audience for this article includes people that read the San Jose Mercury News regularly, people that visit Yosemite, people that are afraid of wild animal attacks, and since it was the front-page story, people that may walk by a newsstand (thus, it should be more eye-catching in terms in title and content). 

Purpose: The purpose of the article is to provide audience awareness of both the history of bears (emphasizing the damage they cause) and bear management in Yosemite as well as strategies and techniques that campers can use to avoid encounters with said bears. 

Method: The author uses an interesting strategy of personifying the bears in Yosemite by giving them human traits such as describing them as “breaking into cars” and calling them “marauders.”  He begins the article using these terms to not only to make the bears seem more human, but to make the bears seem like evil humans.  The author does this in order to establish a problem: evil bears in Yosemite.  According to M. Jimmie Killingsworth, this would be an appeal to the body in two ways: first, giving human qualities to a non-human entity, and second, by dehumanizing said entity.  In addition, calling bears “marauders” is an appeal to tropes since the author is making a comparison between two things without using “like” or “as.”  He uses this metaphor in order to add more description to his perceived attitude of the bears.  Then, he offers a solution to the bear problem.

              The next section of the article details a history of black bears in Yosemite, the amount of damage done over the years (both monetary and human casualty), and measures that the park rangers have implemented to stem the tide of bears causing damage.  This is an appeal to time as well as an appeal to evidence and authority.  The appeals come in the form of the statistics of bear damage to property and casualties due to bears from 1980 to today.  The appeal to time claims that the bear situation is getting better over time, and the appeal to evidence stems from the inclusion of numerical facts in the form of bar graphs.  The article appeals to authority by detailing the actions that park rangers, experts in their field, have implemented to help prevent bear encounters.  Subtly, the article also makes an appeal to place; the article does not claim that people or bears should leave Yosemite.  Instead, the author implies that this place, Yosemite, is a place that can be shared by both people and bears alike in a harmonious manner.  Thus, the author advocates for a shared space.

              In the final section, the article addresses what steps campers can take to avoid contact with a bear.  This is another appeal to the body because the author assumes that all of his readers have bodies as well as all of those people would like to keep their bodies free from bear injury.  Thus, sharing safety tips appeals to people’s love for their body.

M. Jimmie Killingsworth's Appeals in Modern Rhetoric Ch. 6-10

Appeals to the body: since everyone has a body and is affected by similar issues associated with the body such as hunger and sex drive, advertisers frequently target body-focused messages in order to reach the maximum amount of potential customers.  In a similar manner, rhetoricians can use the same technique to guide others into adopting a new point of view.  For example, an author or speaker can describe nature or politics in terms of a human body with head, hands, stomach, etc.  In addition, bodies can also be dehumanized when it comes to enemies or emphasized when it comes to physical disabilities.  And finally, with the rise of technology, the lines between body and technology blur even further with each technological advancement.

Appeals to gender: careful attention should be made when stereotyping gender as well as sexuality.  In addition, rhetoricians should be conscious of the power dynamic such as differences in political power between the sexes.  Also, the rhetorician should beware that the line between exploitation and empowerment can be blurred and that both phenomena can even occur simultaneously.  And finally, authors should never identify one gender in terms of the opposite gender.

Appeals to race: rhetoricians should beware of “othering” people of other races or backgrounds.  This phenomenon is related to dehumanizing or demonizing, and it favors one group of people over another.  Professors should also remember that becoming a successful academic does not necessarily mean that the student should shed their familial, communal, or cultural background.  It is important that all races have an equal opportunity to learn, and an important factor between the powerful and the powerless is education. 

Appeals through tropes: rhetoricians can make appeals through tropes such as metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony.  Basically, the four tropes can be broken down into the following categories: identity, association, representation, and reversal of expectations respectively.  An interesting book to check out would be George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s book Metaphors We Live By which details how the human experience is founded on our ability to create and understand metaphors.  

The appeal of narrative: narratives can take the form of illustrations, examples, and anecdotes; they are in contrast to data or statistical forms of evidence.  Whereas data-based evidence is usually the pre-dominant form of evidence in specialized fields, the narrative structure is the pre-dominant form to communicate concepts to those outside the field.  This is because people outside of the Discourse community may not be familiar with the history, logic, or technical jargon of the specialized field.  Thus, narratives require storytellers to have a sense of audience awareness to judge what each audience needs to hear.  Storytelling has three purposes: to build a community, reinforce values, and to teach life lessons.  Narratives are also more democratic than data because everyone can listen to a story and anyone can be a storyteller.  If someone has experienced a unique situation or been a part of a unique community, then that person has the authority to tell a story on that subject; that person can instruct others and allow others to change their perspectives through vicarious experience.  Thus, narratives should show rather than tell.

Commentary: personally, I have a fascination with the narrative form.  As a kid, I would always look forward to the telling of a good bed-time story.  In reference to the chapter on appeals to the body, there are channels that cater to specific groups.  For instance, SpikeTV for men, ESPN for sports fans, Oxygen for women, and Speed for racing fans are all channels that cater to a specific demographic.  I notice that the more specific the audience, the more data is used.  For example, a World Series of Poker broadcast would have multiple statistics on the screen simultaneously.  Football analysis on ESPN usually includes multiple sets of data such as completion percentage, passer rating, total yards, etc.  On the other hand, the same story meant for a wider audience such as a nightly newscast would leave out most of the statistics and focus on the narrative such as “team X rallied from behind in order to overcome team Y in the final quarter.”  Even on SpikeTV where their most famous shows are Cops and 1001 Ways to Die, both shows deliver a narrative followed by a set of data.  In Cops, after the narrative of the police arresting the perpetrator, the police officer explains the law broken and the punishment for the offender; in 1001 Ways to Die, after the narrative of how a person died, the show’s narrator explains the science behind each death.  On the other hand, the most frequent use of data-based evidence on a newscast comes from surveys and eye-witness accounts, lesser reliable forms of data.  Thus, the more specific the audience, the more data should be incorporated into the message.  This is an important lesson for rhetoricians and falls under the umbrella of audience awareness: general population should focus on narratives while specific groups should focus on data.  However, this contrasts with the techniques in Killingsworth’s final chapter where he claims that narrative works better for an audience of adolescents than data.  In addition, the specific audience of the ancient tribesmen would favor more of a narrative structure than a data-driven one.  So, even though the audience may be specific, the rhetorician should use his or her best judgment to determine whether to focus on narrative or data-based arguments.

M. Jimmie Killingsworth's Appeals in Modern Rhetoric Ch. 1-5

Preface: I found it interesting that the author considers the body as a means of rhetoric.  Previously, I never would have categorized a riot or political protest as a rhetorical tool; however, it now seems to make perfect sense, and I look forward to reading that chapter.

General Introduction: I found it interesting that Marshall McLuhan claims that sex appeal actually appeals to the widest available audience because “most people experience sexual desire and hunger, after all, since everyone lives in a body” (Killingsworth 5).  Previously, I have been conditioned into believing that sex appeal is alienating and degrading rather than appealing to the widest audience.

Appeal to Authority: I found it interesting that different audiences require different appeals to authority.  For instance, the more academic the audience, the more academic the evidence should be.  Conversely, the more folksy and down-to-earth the audience, the more folksy and down-to-earth the evidence should be.  This definitely caused me a little cognitive dissonance since I thought that good evidence was good evidence regardless of audience.

Rhetorical Situation: I found it interesting that the author/actor attempts to relate to the audience in order to bridge the gap between potential differences.  For instance, a politician might mention how her father was a school teacher when speaking to a group of educators.  However, it is mentioned in this chapter that when an author/actor chooses to relate to the audience, the author/actor also runs the risk of alienating those in the audience who cannot relate.  Thus, the author/actor should know the audience and wisely choose which bridge would reach the most people in the audience, or the author/actor can implement a multitude of bridges that cover more and more ground.  For instance, the previous politician might attempt to relate to educators through growing up with an educator for a parent in addition to later mentioning how she is a proud parent with a child in the educational system.  This would resonate with both educators as well as parents. 

Appeal to Time: I found it interesting that rhetoricians can use time as a tool to increase the persuasiveness of their message.  For instance, they can claim that people should return to the past, learn from the past, embrace change, or value the future.  This chapter also has my favorite quote thus far: “With the development of the atom bomb, people became particularly aware of the break with the past.  The power to destroy the world with a single decision – the kind of power that had before been the prerogative of the gods – now fell into human hands” (Killingsworth 43).

Appeal to Place: This was definitely the most interesting chapter because it introduces the notion that rhetoricians can make the argument that a place is sacred as well as the argument that a place should be taken over (an imperialistic philosophy).  In addition, it touches on the idea of cyberspace as a real place as well as its implications for nature and environmentalism.

Commentary: I appreciate how this reading presents different appeals as a means for rhetoric.  As I mentioned previously, I never would have thought about the appeals to time, place, or body.  I am especially fascinated with the role of technology and its future importance in the field of rhetoric.  With society’s continued reliance on technology, what effect will this have on rhetoric?  Will the field of rhetoric shift its focus to more online and telecommunication subjects of study?  How does online communication affect rhetoric and the means of effectively communicating messages?  These are all interesting questions that will grow with relevance as technology becomes more and more a part of our daily lives.

Unintentionally Rhetorical

In Lindemann’s article, “What do Teachers Need to Know about Rhetoric?” He argues that the majority of the history of rhetoric is an elaboration on the theories introduced by ancient Greco-Roman rhetoricians.  However, more contemporary scholars have begun to include an interdisciplinary perspective, an exploration of alternative rhetorical mediums, and a redefinition of rhetoric altogether.  This is evident in Lloyd F. Bitzer’s article, “The Rhetorical Situation,” where he attempts to redefine a rhetorical situation.  In his article, he claims that “Every audience at any moment is capable of being changed in some way by speech; persuasive situation is altogether general” (3).  However, he does not take his observation to the next step and claim that all communication is rhetorical.  Non-verbal communication is extremely rhetorical, and it is constantly sending messages whether the sender intends to or not.  For example, wearing a Hawaiian shirt communicates a rhetorical message to everyone whether the wearer intends to convey that message when he or she put the shirt on or not.  He or she is consciously or unconsciously attempting to persuade others as to the character of the wearer.  The same applies for all non-verbal actions such as body language and tonality.  All messages attempt to convey something to an audience (whether present or absent).  In this respect, my philosophy of rhetoric more closely aligns with Kenneth Burke’s when Lindemann claims, “Burke’s major contribution to rhetorical theory is his attempt to broaden its scope and to connect all acts of language to the social fabric of the culture in which they occur” (55).  In this sense, rhetoric is unavoidable; it is constantly occurring, and subjects can be both conscious or unconscious of their rhetorical messages.