Blair and Beauty and Other Stuff

During our class discussion last week about Blair's view on Taste, I started wondering what exactly is beauty since it was said that Taste can be equated to beauty. To me, physical beauty is something that is hard to define, however, our media tries very hard to depict what is beautiful. They make lists of the sexiest celebrities and even lists of the un-sexiest almost like they are trying to define the extremes for others. Personally, I view pop culture’s view of beauty to be expensive, hard to reach, and self-serving. There is such pressure on men and women to appear beautiful that they are willing to partake in extreme solutions like surgery or diets. Whatever happened to internal beauty? Whatever happened to messages about feeling good about yourself or that it is okay to not have the nose of some celebrity. Why do we allow ourselves to get so wrapped up in what others think? Who knows, I sure don’t.

Well, I suppose I digressed from discussing the topic from rhetorical theory. So on that same page, I want to announce that if anyone is looking for a Graduate Assistantship, mine will be free next semester. I am currently the GA in University Communications, but I am going back to Kansas City for numerous reasons. If you want more information on the GA position, contact me at andrea512@missouristate.edu.

Response on Astell

After the class discussion on Mary Astell, it made me wonder about rhetoricians in today’s society. She advocated that to be a good rhetorician, a person had to be unbiased, had to reduce their passions about a topic, had to make concise arguments, and had to be a good Christian. What I am supposing in her sense that “good” meant morally good. For in today’s society, I am not sure viewers of pop culture hold people up to those standards. An example of this is political speeches. Many times politicians are obscure and diverge from the particular question that was asked of them, but members of society see this as part of the norm. And, if they sound “pretty” while answering the questions, they are seen as eloquent and good speakers.

Another thing I thought was interesting was how she believed that to be a good rhetorician someone had to be Christian. While I am a Christian, I believe her viewpoint was biased on the grounds that there are many people who are successful at speaking but aren’t of the Christian faith. Granted she lived during the 15^th-16^th centuries, but in today’s world we see that there were non-Christian leaders who moved groups and nations towards betterment by their rhetoric abilities. Personally, I prefer the ancients’ look that to be a good rhetorician (in the moral sense) is to be a good person since it is more inclusive.

Thomas Wilson

Last week, I enjoyed the discussion about Thomas Wilson and his Art of Rhetorique. I thought his views on rhetoric were important because he advocated for uniform composition practices. These composition practices can still be seen today. For instance Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style. Like Wilson, they outlined step-by-step ways to make writing better and they gave examples of good writing. Another thing I liked about Wilson was he used humor in his writing to engage the audience in his topic. In my technical writing seminar, we are discussing the appropriateness of humor in technical documents. While humor is not fitted for all documents, it can be useful in others that have a close relationship to the audience. At first, Wilson’s humor was lost on me. When reading through it by myself I didn’t recognize it because it was so subtle. According to the text in my other class, that is a flaw with using humor. An author shouldn’t be so subtle that the message is lost on the reader or the reader takes it for real information. When using humor, I imagine it is very hard to not be too sarcastic or too subtle, and I suppose it is a true art to find a happy medium.

Quintilian

Last week’s discussion on Quintilian was interesting in that it opened up a dialogue on schools and education. Quintilian was interested in a school that was conducive to teacher and student relations whether it be a school house, a forum, or out in real life. As for his students, he believed that they should be somewhat exuberant in their learning. He also allowed young women to study because they could pick up good mothering and parenting skills. As for the teachers, he believed that there should be different teaching methods employed depending on the student’s age. The very young students should have the most experienced and unbiased teachers, while the older students should have teachers that are well learned. These teachers should also be gentle with students, be interesting, be praiseworthy of student accomplishments, and be moderately corrective to not overwhelm the student.

For the most part, I believe that Quintilian had some interesting and new ideas about education. I am glad that Quintilian allowed females into his schools; however he underestimated their learning capabilities. Despite the beliefs of the time, women are just as capable as men to contemplate complex and abstract ideas. I also agree that young students should have experienced and unbiased teachers. Young students are very impressionable and usually don’t have the analytical skills like their older peers. What they learn early on serves as a foundation for years to come. If students learn the wrong facts a lot of unlearning has to happen. This unlearning then takes away from time that could have been spent on learning new facts. Some things that I was taught that weren’t necessarily true or effective were Columbus discovered America, phonics, pilgrims and colonists were nice to the Native Americans, and citizens elect the president. Granted it didn’t take a very long time to relearn the information, but I feel that it wasn’t fair I was taught only the shades of these issues. Sure, teaching how Columbus was not a hero and how he subjected the natives to slavery probably wouldn’t be the easiest to do in the elementary years, but it would be the truth. I think that by giving students an idealistic perception of American history can color their judgements about our role in the world. Anyway, onto another subjuect, I believe that learning language through phonics greatly hindered me because my spelling skills were behind my peers when I switched to another school district. The method of phonics made me consider language through sound rather than through its correct spelling. If it wasn't for the dictionary or spell check I might still be spelling cat "kat", might "mite", or school "skool."

Response for Sept. 18, 2007

Last class period, we spent a good amount of time on the McComiskey article. In the article, the author made arguments to why the real Gorgias wouldn’t have answered the way Plato made him. I thought that his article was interesting because he used a tone and language that made it very convincing to me. The question “did Plato really distort sophistic beliefs to suit his own purposes” was presented at the beginning of the discussion. After reflecting on what other classmates had to say, I believe that Plato did distort the beliefs somewhat. For instance in the second claim, Plato gets Gorgias to accept absolute knowledge, however, in real life he would have rejected it because of his beliefs in the senses. The sophists were interested in the action of an audience, and in some ways Plato was too. Plato didn’t just desire truth and absolute knowledge, he was also persuading his audience to accept his views, school of thought, and teachings. I found it interesting that Plato viewed the sophists with such disdain when he himself was using rhetorical devices.
The other article we spent time on was also interesting in that it was very informative into what kairos was. Before reading the article, I had a vague sense of the word from a freshman philosophy class I took. Anyway, I really enjoyed adapting that to the Martin Luther King Jr. speech. I thought it illustrated the importance of anticipating speaking opportunities and of taking advantage of them when they happen. This is a very elementary example, but I have one friend who does not employ kairos. For instance, she talks about any subject at any time to really anyone. She’s not concerned with the timeliness or appropriateness of her speech because she is more interested in just getting attention from others. Basically, she is not in tune with the community needs around her and is more interested in her own voice. Overall, I think that it is important for people to develop good speaking skills because not only are people making judgments about the speaker and the subject, but they are also making judgments about those associated with the speaker and the subject.

Response for Sophist Rhetoric

From our discussion last week, I found the idea of the other interesting. Before this class, I have never heard of the subject of discrimination put that way, but it makes sense because the privileged group makes the minority feel like subcitizens. I thought this idea was also interesting in that it could be applied to rhetoric. For instance, Jarratt comments that rhetoric and women are trivialized by identification with sensuality, costume, and color. Instead of being recognized for its good qualities, rhetoric is only seen superficially and made to be an other by different disciplines.
In addition to the topic of the other, I thought the discussion about women’s writing was interesting. The argument was made that women can write from both genders because they are living in male dominated cultures, and that men can’t. I found that to be somewhat true. While some male writers can get away with employing a feminine persona, there are others who definitely can’t. I think this shines through when a sensitive or sensual scene arises. I am probably being somewhat stereotypical, but it seems that many times male writers don’t handle their female characters with the same tenderness a woman writer might.
Another discussion I thought was interesting was the history on female rhetoricians. Aspasia was particularly fascinating because even though none of her writing survived, she was still able to live on through other people’s writing. She had a great influence and even contributed to speeches made by Pericle’s. However, I don’t find it surprising that none of her writing survived. It seemed that there were enough people that didn’t like her that maybe they wanted to erase the history of her. Or, maybe she didn’t even do her own writing and just contributed to and critiqued the rhetorics of others. Who knows, though, since there are so many possibilities in speculating the past.

Response for 9/4/07

I would like to begin by commenting on The Gorgias by Plato. Like Plato’s other work, I found Socrates to be longwinded and rather boring. I have a feeling that his other listeners did too. For instance, both Polus and Callicles resort to giving Socrates one word or one sentence responses. I know that for others, giving such short answers is usually an indicator that they hope the speaker will hurry up and make their argument. On the topic of arguments, I thought the one Socrates made about pleasure and pain was very interesting. He uses the example of quenching thirst as a pleasurable thing because in it is the absence of pain, and in turn pleasure and pain can’t be present at the same time. I find his argument faulty because to feel pleasure you don’t have to be in pain first. Like it was demonstrated in class, someone could be very happy and then more happiness could come to them. More happiness wasn’t a result of pain, it just occurred.

Departing from Plato’s Gorgias, I would like to comment on Gorgias’ own work the Ecomium to Helen. While at first it appears to be a story about Helen not being responsible, it turns out to be a defense of rhetoric. While if that was the point of Gorgias’ work, we will never know, but John Poulakos makes a great case for it in his essay. Like Poulakos said, Gorgias probably disguised the argument because the art of rhetoric was adopting a bad reputation and the Athenians were intolerant of anything that disrupted their culture. Since his art and profession were under scrutiny, he wanted to find a way to defend it without getting into major trouble. So, he disguised the argument by making rhetoric=Helen. The argument I found most interesting was that the blame shouldn’t be on the art of rhetoric, but instead on the men who use it unwisely. I feel that same line of reason can be adapted to other things. I am probably way out there in my reasoning, but it reminds me of people who don’t take the blame for their own actions when they use something in a manner it wasn’t intended for.

Overall, I think I am understanding rhetoric a little bit better, but there is still a mountain of information that I don’t. I am glad that I was able to lead the discussion on the opening chapter in our text book because I was able to look up a lot of new terms in order to better understand the subject. I thought it was interesting to read how Plato and Aristotle still dominate the modes of thought for the western world when Plato was such a totalitarian. Maybe it’s just me, but I am more attracted to the sophist side. I like how they view values coming from within a person. I also liked how they attempted to get a sense of the community they were addressing. As a technical writer, one of the most basic components in creating a document is to perform an audience analysis. Your document won’t be successful if it isn’t tailored correctly. I also like the sophists because I tend to root for the underdog. In what we have read so far, the culture of the time didn’t accept them. However, I keep crossing my fingers that somehow will see them pull ahead.

The Phaedrus

Reading response: The Phaedrus

I am not ashamed to say that while reading through the Phaedrus I became lost or confused by the language of the speakers. However, after the explanations in class, I feel a lot more confident about the different topics that were being presented by Socrates and Phaedrus. Some times, when reading ancient texts, it is hard to see how they relate to readers now. I felt that there were some interesting points made by Socrates that still hold true in today’s society.
First, I thought his chariot analogy was timeless and could be incorporated into the present. The analogy is about a soul who is driving a chariot with a good horse that stays inline with truths and a bad horse that tries to sway the soul. The soul must then struggle to maintain control over the bad horse in order to allow the good horse to drive him. I think that this analogy still holds true because it centers on human nature. Human nature, I am guessing, hasn’t changed that much over the centuries. Sure, we have evolved, but there was and still is the constant struggle between good and evil that goes on inside of us. It is important for people to maintain control over their “evil” desires so they can maintain a good life. If someone struggles too much with their bad horse, then they miss out on the goodness life has to offer.
A second point I thought still holds true was when Socrates was discussing good speaking skills. Phaedrus was saying how he heard it was a disgrace to write speeches, but Socrates rebuked him saying that the disgrace was in speaking and writing badly. While today people probably don’t think that speech writing is a bad job, it is safe to say that they don’t like listening to an ill-written one. Today, if someone can’t communicate concisely and coherently, they aren’t going to get much praise. For instance, celebrities and politicians are frequently made fun of because of their poor communication skills. The biggest target as of late is President George W. Bush. Much of the American public equates the position of President as someone who is an eloquent speaker. They want someone who will represent them to outside countries as a competent population. Personally, I feel that it is a disgrace that someone in such a high position doesn’t have the necessary public speaking skills.
Overall, I enjoyed the Phaedrus after I got a chance to hear my classmates explain parts of the speeches. I really liked seeing the text brought to life. It gave me a chance to really understand the different aspects in their conversation. For instance, the wordiness and self-assurance of Socrates.

Blog Lines

I hope I did this right!

Welcome to my blog for 626

Hi class. My name is Andrea. I am 22 years old, and I am originally from Overland Park, KS. I am taking this class to go towards my requirements for my MA in Technical Writing. In addition to class, I am a GA for University Communications, a server at Tonic, and a grant writer for Christina Ryder and Associates. When I am not in class or work, I like to spend time with my fiance and our two cats...I know, I am so exciting.