Proposal

In response to the Sophists of his day, Quintillian taught and wrote with the explicit purpose of receiving students at a younger age to facilitate their moral and oratory development. But, as revealed over and over in our private-made-public culture, one need not be on the moral high-ground to deliver an effective, sublime speech. I just wonder whether the crowd reflects later on the inconsistencies between what is proclaimed and how the proclaimer lives offstage. So, maybe the immediate delivery is effective, but the long-term significance of a Sophistic speech diminishes. Much like the message against smoking or drinking to excess is lost on the child of a parent who enjoys a nightly cocktail hour, an audience potentially rejects the message due to the hypocrisy of the messenger. However, Augustine warns of the potential for moral decay if an audience is swayed by the effectiveness of a speaker toward a direction that is detrimental to the public’s best interests. So, a bad man can be rhetorically effective, according to Augustine. Trouble is, in our post-modern times, who are we to teach our or others' children who is bad and what is right?

Reacting to Quintillian’s student-centered search for the ideal, moral orator, Ramus “utterly denies that … moral philosophy has anything to do with rhetoric” (Bizzell 560). In Arguments in Rhetoric against Quintillian, Ramus accurately points out, “he [Quintillian] identifies those virtuous qualities of character as justice, courage, self-control, prudence … and many other attributes worthy of praise” (565). Ramus thus establishes the proposition that the two elements of ethos espoused by Quintillian, and supported by Augustine: creditability of the speaker and expertise with regard to the message are, and should be, separated. Not only did Ramus move style away from logic, thus isolating rhetoric in the realm of stylistics, but also he removed moral responsibility from the orator, proclaiming: “, “such a definition of an orator seems to me to be useless and stupid” (565) Ramus thus establishes the proposition oft debated in composition studies: “The definition of an artist which covers more than is included within the limits of the art is faulty” (565). Ramus argues for a plain style and for a separation of rhetoric from dialectic.  Ramus begs consideration of the premise that the collective limit their thinking on the underlying, elusive kairos when they concentrate efforts on attacking the morals of the messenger rather than critically analyzing more pertinent issues. Foucaultian institutional power retains its grip when the populous tranfixes itself on the hypocrisy of the orator in contrast to the ideologies he or she promulgates. Parental authority also results in control over discourse and ideological thinking that first-year students should be encouraged to critique as they work with deciphering their positions with regard to discourses on race and social justice. 

While I agree that we run the risk of limiting our thinking on the underlying kairos when we attack the morals of the messenger rather than critically analyzing more pertinent issues, I, along with hooks, Terry Tempest Williams, Patricia J. Williams, my mother, and other feminist scholars, propose that one’s actions should coincide with one’s rhetoric of choice. Quintillian’s quest for the ideal orator will always be met with the disappointment of human hypocrisy, but we can compassionately work with the fallibility of scholars who conscientiously update Frerean praxis for the twenty-first century Composition classroom. Which then leads to another oft-debated discussion regarding the purpose of a composition course: Should teachers of rhetoric focus only on what is necessary to learn to be persuasively effective, or should the composition classroom focus primarily on critical theory and the need for social, political, and economic reform?

Like Quintillian, I’m interested in focusing on the early lessons in rhetoric that shape the social construction of the individual by discussing the aims of parenting and teaching rhetoric in our post-modern era. While I admit Ramus’ thesis proves more logically and realistically convincing in that one need not be a moral role model living a life geared toward the advancement of social justice in order to be an effective orator, his rhetorical purposes fall short of exacting relevant analysis of present day racial, economic, political and social turmoil. If we need not live up to the messages we espouse, who will personify the ethos needed to be a catalyst for change? I find it very hard to believe people will rally behind a leader they do not respect. The issue becomes what characteristics are valued and by whom; what values and ideologies does the culture, through parents and teachers, imprint upon its youth? Are these ideologies accepted or rejected and why? Just as Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Quintillian and Ramus, debated in their respective turns, I am curious about who is doing the teaching and what their purposes may be, remembering the first teachers children encounter are parents.

The full text explores parenting and educational rhetoric grounded in experience and theory. My on-going project questions how institutions of family and of learning both advance and challenge ideologies concerning race, poverty and social justice.