JRP Submission ID#115
Title: The Art of Rhetoric as Self-Discipline
Submitted on July 14, 2007
Review Expected in 2 weeks

KEYWORDS

Autocritography; Interdisciplinarity; Pre-Socratic Philosophers;
Rhetoric; Epistemology

EXTRACTS

--
Although most rhetoricians may conceive of our discipline as concerned
with the study of writing and speaking to persuade, it happens that,
usually with a nod or a bow to the ancients, a very great range of
subjects has entered rhetoric's tent; some have remained; others have
departed and may return; still others, unknown, approach. In the
sixteenth century, for instance, Listenius created a rhetorical
framework called musica poetica, which he founded on the oration. His
work has been furthered by composers and music theorists, including
Leonard Bernstein, who has lectured on figures and tropes in concert
music. Visual images and graphic design are rhetorical commonplaces
today. . . .

The question that concerns me is in fact how the rhetorician, faced
with this crush of possibilities, is to define rhetoric for the
purpose of formulating a scholarly program. My own solution has been
to conceptualize the art of rhetoric as self-discipline, an extension
of inner necessity and a framework in which I may come to integrate
the scientific and artistic, public and private elements of my
personality by inquiring into the influence of symbols on my life. . . .

Interdisciplinary degrees, programs, and certificates have become
legion across academe, and interdisciplinarity in the field of
rhetoric now is accessed through well established avenues such as
writing-across-the-curriculum initiatives and visual studies. As such
possibilities for professional development have become
institutionalized, the field has indeed broadened, but I have
continued to be perplexed by these questions: Is the entire sphere of
human inquiry and activity open to me, as many rhetorically minded
thinkers have claimed and, arguably, demonstrated? And, if so, how am
I to design a scholarly program? . . .
--

Request interested reviewers to kindly respond.

DP