The Rhetoric Garage

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And Now, for Something Not So Completely Different
2007-08-27 05:12:00
Hi all,Sorry for my unpardonable silence of late. For a number of reasons, I've been lax in keeping up with the blog over the summer. Here are some of them:I started the blog a bit too shortly after the fall of He Who Shall Not Be Named--I needed more of a rest!I had filled my plate over the summer with a number of other writing projects that had higher priority (rightly or wrongly).This current blog reminded me a bit too much of your typical, run-on-the-mill political bitch and moan blog, of which there are already way too many.A related point: my desire to link my academic interests in rhetoric with popular political commentary wasn't quite working in the context of this blog--at least not to the extent I hoped.I was growing weary of Blogger. It's a great program, but I was wanting to get a bit more sophisticated in my knowledge of website/blog stuff, and needed some time to get up to speed on what else was out there and how to use it.The good news (at least from my point of ...
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O'Reilly Upended by Rhetorical Judo
2007-06-04 22:39:00
Bill “Papa Bear” O’Reilly used formidable one-two combination of name-calling and straw man argumentation when he suggested that the man who traveled to Europe after being diagnosed with TB was acting in line with “secular progressive” values. According to O’Reilly, secular progressives "put themselves above all others. That philosophy says, 'Me first, then I'll worry about you,'" while "traditional-values people put others on a par with themselves."Who “secular progressives” are isn’t clear. It’s simply a term O’Reilly means to be pejorative (name-calling). The way to make it pejorative is to associate it with yucky things, such as selfishness. So O’Reilly constructs a fictional entity called “secular progressives” who hold the beliefs he attributes to them (the classic "straw man" fallacy).Not only does this allow him to turn a specific incident in to a commentary on a huge group of people whose politics he disagrees with (something we’ve seen plen...
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War. What Is It Good For?
2007-05-21 21:50:00
War. What is it good for?Well, it makes a good metaphor to deploy if you want to maintain even slight support for your foreign policy.Plenty of people have noted that the “war on terror” is a metaphor that the Bush administration wants to take literally. What’s even more interesting to me, though, is the way the conflict in Iraq is framed (to use George Lakoff’s term) using the metaphor of “war.”I’ve mentioned previously that what’s going on in Iraq is not so much a war as a disastrous occupation. But “war” is the word that is used to describe it, not only by the administration, but by people across the board, including those adamantly opposed to Bush’s Iraq policy.From a rhetorical point of view, the important thing is to think about what using that term means. It’s not an arbitrary word choice—it affects how we think about what’s going on.Tabling for the moment whether what’s happening in Iraq meets the dictionary definition of “war,” and if so, w...
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Talking Heads Tilted Right
2007-05-16 18:26:00
Sorry for my absence—the end of the semester, as it usually does, has swallowed most of my free time of late.Just a brief observation about the public sphere as it’s now enacted through the media: have you noticed that between dinner and bedtime, you can actually find it difficult to find anything like “news” on the 24 hour cable networks? Moreover, what you get instead (commentary) is heavily weighted to the conservative side of things. On any given weeknight, channel surfing CNN, Headline News, MSNBC, and FOX, you’ll come across former GOP Representative Joe Scarborough holding forth for an hour. Flip the channel, and you get the risible Glenn Beck. Bow ties your thing? You’ve got an hour of Tucker Carlson you can watch. Want the semblance of balance without actually wanting to deal with the real McCoy? You’ve got Hannity and Colmes (or, as Al Franken more accurately terms it, Hannity and Colmes). Fiscal conservatism and anti-immigrant rhetoric float your boat...
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Are We Becoming "Little Horowitzes?"
2007-05-02 22:22:00
Apologies if this seems like shameless double-dipping, but the following entry is cross posted from a posting on a communications studies discussion board to which I belong. After I wrote it, I realized it would also be appropriate for this blog as well. The discussion is about Ward Churchill, the University of Colorado professor who wrote, just after 9/11, that those who were killed could be considered "little Eichmanns." A committee at Colorado found some problems with plagiarism and uncited sources in some of Churchill's earlier work. The debate is essentially on whether academics should support Churchill under the aegis of defending academic freedom or shun him as a violator of academic principles and therefore someone we should wash our hands of. That should be enough context to follow the post below. Just one more thing: I make reference to a previous post mentioning that the committee at UC used an analogy of a police officer stopping a car for speeding because it had a bump...
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Rush Limbaugh, Part Duh
2007-04-27 20:40:00
As a follow up on yesterday's post, it's worth noting that Rush Limb augh continues to spin his wheels concerning his assertion that Seung-Hui Cho "had to have been a liberal."Yesterday, we saw that he tried to write it off as a joke and/or an experiment on how liberals (e.g., Media Matters for America) take things "out of context."The problem with that explanation is A) MMFA quoted him in context, providing a transcript an audio version of his remarks, and B) Limbaugh said that he really believed what he said.Yesterday, he repeated the idea that he was simply "baiting" MMFA. As we noted yesterday, however, the motivation behind his comments are immaterial insofar as they are offensive no matter what the context is. Limbaugh went further by saying that MMFA (and others) should learn to "stop being baited when I am baiting you."He also claimed that "everyone who listens to me agrees with what I said, so where's the controvesy?"Such shabby argument barely warrants a response, but ju...
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Your Momma!
2007-04-26 19:32:00
Your momma is so dumb, it takes her two hours to watch “60 minutes!”Laughing? Probably not. It might be because the joke isn’t all that clever. But it also might be that even though I don’t know your momma, saying something demeaning about her, even when it’s intended as “humor,” is insulting and hurtful.That’s the whole point behind “The Dozens”—particularly “You momma is so . . .” jokes. It makes no difference if you know the joke teller has never met your mother; just commenting on her appearance, intelligence, or sexual proclivities is enough make you burn.Why is that, and what does it have to do with Rush Limbaugh? (And no, I won’t go into a litany of “Your right-wing demagogue radio host is so fat . . . “ jokes.)I suggest it’s because words do things. Words are actions, not passive containers of “truth.” If they were, “Your momma” jokes would be meaningless. If you told me, “Ted, your momma is so fat, when she jumped up in the air, t...
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Rhetoric on the Radio
2007-04-23 17:47:00
On NPR this weekend, the show "American Weekend" had a story on the tactics of political rhetoric, complete with specific examples of rhetorical figures from American political speeches and discussing the origins of rhetoric in ancient Athens. You can listen to the show online. The webpage also has links to some rhetoric-related websites, including one that illustrates a large number of rhetorical figures through audio examples from American political speeches.It's worth a listen.Some questions:What do you think about the characterization of ancient Athens in the piece, particularly in its alleged difference from contemporary America vis-a-vis rhetoric?Republican pollster and spinmeister Frank Luntz is interviewed in the piece. Is what he does "rhetoric?" If so, is it good rhetoric? Bad rhetoric? Good rhetoric used for bad purposes?At times, it seemed to me the piece suggested that "rhetoric" as it was defined in this context is a practice of putting style before substance and pers...
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Dissemination of a Failure
2007-04-20 20:02:00
This post is a failure.Perhaps more accurately, it’s a description of a failure.At first, I didn’t think there would be much to say about the horror at Virginia Tech from a communication/rhetorical perspective. Perhaps down the line, some sort of analysis of the media coverate might be interesting and important. Already, some have discussed how new forms of media like Facebook and Myspace played a role in disseminating information during and after the murders. But nothing substantive came to my mind.As the week has worn on, though, certain bits and pieces suggest that ideas of communication, and its limitations play a role.I’ve tried to formulate coherent thoughts on this, but I’ve failed. I’ve started this post in a number of ways, and deleted them all. All I have are fragments of ideas, loose threads that I can’t tie up, at least not yet.If I was able to, I’d want to say something about how the killer’s, Cho Seung-hui’s, unwillingness or inability to communicate ...
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Britain Ditches "War" Talk
2007-04-19 19:10:00
In a story related to my last post, international development secretary Hilary Benn of Britain made a speech a couple of days ago criticizing the use of the phrase "war on terror."http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/ news/uk/article1660976.ece
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Why Even Pacifists Love "War"
2007-04-19 18:54:00
I remember when I was a kid, I had hundreds and hundreds of toy soldiers. A whole ice chest full of them. Not to mention all the tanks, trucks, halftracks, artillery pieces, etc. I loved setting up elaborate battles in which these plastic figures would die again and again and again.Why did I do this? I suppose I could say that I had always been interested in history, and this was one way of “playing” at history.But on the other hand, I didn’t use plastic figures to recreate the Constitutional Convention or the completion of the transcontinental railroad. It was war I played at.Always war.Why?There’s an answer to this question, but, in keeping with the theme of this blog, I’d like to approach it from a rhetorical point of view.Much like my 8-year-old self, George W. Bush likes to play at war, too. He certainly likes talking about it. In Monday's statement about the Iraq “War” Supplemental spending bill, he surrounded himself with veterans and their families. He also us...
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The Duke Lacrosse Case: An Idelogical Critique
2007-04-12 22:33:00
The decision yesterday to drop all charges against the three Duke lacrosse players accused (at least initially) of raping a woman who was performing as an exotic dancer at a team party has brought up one of the ongoing questions in my mind about this case: why did this issue become politicized in the way it did?In this post, I offer one take on this question through the use of ideological criticism.Ideological rhetorical criticism focuses on the ways power is created, maintained, used, and abused in society, and the ways in which language is used in these processes. Such critical approaches would include feminist, Marxist, and postcolonial criticism, although ideological criticism need not fall into any of these categories.Part of the role of the ideological critic is to use criticism to advance a social or political cause through questioning and investigating how language is used by power structures to conceal and maintain themselves. In other words, ideological critics tend to wea...
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Semiotic Clouds
2007-04-10 19:28:00
A guy by the name of Juri Lotman, an early film theorist, came up with the idea of the “semiotic aura.” Like many academic terms, it’s a fancy word for something we all have a sense of already from our own experience, but gives it a specific name.“Semi otic aura” refers to the way in which actors who appear in movies bring their “persona” from previous roles to each new movie they appear in. That is, even if Sylvester Stallone appears in a film adaptation of Krapp’s Last Tape, he still brings with him associations the audience has of him as Rocky (and Rambo, etc.) and these will color the meaning of his performance in the new movie, no matter what he does.The “semiotic aura” is something basically of the actor’s own creation, given choices of roles and performances. I think there’s something here that applies to Don Imus that helps explain both why he’s popular and why his most recent excursion into racist rhetoric has drawn the attention and ire it has.But ...
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Limbaughtomy
2007-04-05 21:55:00
There must be a word for it.There must be a technical term for a figure of speech that violates the very precept on which it’s based. Irony is sort of close, but that’s when the speaker knowingly says something at odds with the intended meaning. I’m looking for something that’s done without knowing it.Hypocrisy is closer, but it’s a bit too broad. It refers to saying something that’s at odds with what the speaker does, thinks, or says in other circumstances. What I’m talking about is when the very statement is at odds with itself.Paradox sort of captures it, but not quite. It suggests more of a puzzling quandary than a straightforward violation of a statement’s own content.With the litany of Greek-based terms for rhetorical figures, you’d think that there’d be one that would label this phenomenon clearly. Perhaps there is, but I’m not aware of it.Maybe one could be invented. To dust off my knowledge of Greek, maybe it would be called something like “autoparab...
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The Past Is Gone . . . But Is It Forgotten?
2007-04-04 04:58:00
In the space of just a few hundred words during his latest remarks to the press, Bush used the word “sober” twice. Such fondness for this adjective calls to mind certain peccadilloes of the president’s past that might help explain his problems with remembering time.If there’s anything the president didn’t want to call to his audience’s attention during his remarks about the Congressional Iraq spending legislation, it’s the past—with the obvious exception of September 11, 2001, which was mentioned twice. The president’s remarks revolve around the present and future alone (a future in which, according to him, the stingy “Democrat [sic] party” will undermine the troops by cutting money from the troops—never mind that the bill gives plenty of money to the military, with the caveat that there be some plan for getting them the hell out of Iraq in the foreseeable future).Why should this be the case? I think the answer lies with one of the favored rhetorical techniqu...
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Bush Under the Klieg Lights
2007-03-21 05:28:00
Metaphors say a lot about a text, particularly when the they aren’t meant to be obviously “metaphorical.” That is, the underlying metaphorical structure of a text structures the understanding of the message in important ways.One of the basic ways this comes out in texts is the appeal to sensory metaphors. Bill Clinton “felt” our pain. I might “see” your point. Or I could “hear” where you’re coming from. Something might “smell fishy” about what you say, or it could carry a “whiff” of desperation. I could even leave a bad taste in my mouth.We use these metaphors so often that they often don’t seem much like metaphors at all.I’d suggest that in President Bush ’s most recent bit of damage-control rhetoric in his statement and answers about the firing of several U.S. attorneys, we see two fundamental sensory metaphors at work: sight and sound. The way Bush develops them says a lot about his attitude toward his audience and the issue at hand.A specific phr...
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Recommended Reading at Salon.com
2007-03-13 17:33:00
There's a provocative piece in Salon today on the intellectual sterility of contemporary conservatism. Using the latest bit of hate mongering from Ann Coulter as a jumping off spot, the essay suggests that Coulter is simply one of the more high-profile examples of what the right wing in general has to offer: hatred and resentment (hence the fact that she can say anything, no matter how hateful, and not be abandoned by conservatives). While the essay doesn't use terms like "rhetoric" or "discourse," that's essentially exactly what it's about. It's a short but good read. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.A few questions I've started to mull over and would like to hear thoughts on:Is the piece overly simplistic? Does it engage in the kind of characterization that it accuses conservative rhetoric of using?What is the appropriate liberal/progressive rhetorical response to conservatives? Is it enough to let it eventually crumble on its own (as the author suggests it will),...
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Callin’ Out Cousin Pookie: Clinton and Obama’s Rhetoric at Selma
2007-03-12 03:57:00
For a while, some of the right-wing folks had me intrigued.The talk of Hillary Clinton suddenly taking on a Southern accent during her speech last week at Selma was on the lips of conservative talking heads across the country—just one more example, they suggested, of her cold and calculated political maneuvering.And if Clinton had done that, it would be fascinating (although the fact that she lived for years and years in Arkansas would make it a bit less dramatic than it seems at first glance).But then I saw excerpts of her speech, and from what I could tell, the only part when she dipped into anything like a Southern dialect was when she was quoting from an African American spiritual that contained some idiomatic Black English. The only thing that would make Hillary sound even dopier than suddenly taking on a Southern twang would be to recite Black dialect in her typical upper Midwest accent. That she tried to give the lines a more appropriate reading speaks to her rhetorical com...
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Porn Free: The Rhetorical Role of Matt Sanchez
2007-03-09 02:26:00
Conservative blogger Matt Sanchez offers us a fine example of rhetorical “role creation” in an essay he just penned for Salon.com.You may have heard that Sanchez got his picture taken with Ann Coulter at the event at which she referred to John Edwards as a “faggot.” When the photo surfaced, some noted the irony in a gay man literally embracing Coulter given her comments (which was hardly the first time she’s made offensive remarks about homosexuality). When the fact that Sanchez once starred in gay pornographic movies emerged, the scrutiny intensified.Two main purposes drive Sanchez’s Salon piece. The first is to address his past in the porn industry—a past that he had apparently tried to keep secret. The other is to address why he would apparently condone the use of hateful language directed at a community he’s part of. The implicit question he responds to is, “How can a gay man support someone who attacks your humanity in such a vulgar way?”Sanchez does this by...
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The Humorless Logic of Ann Coulter
2007-03-06 15:30:00
As many have pointed out, there's nothing much new to say about Ann Coulter 's latest bit of vile rhetoric in and of itself. She's made it painfully clear how unpleasant a human being she is, at least in her public persona (I've come to think she doesn't really believe much of anything, but, like a pidgeon in a Skinner box, simply behaves in ways that have proven rewarding in the past.)There are two larger points to make. One is about the use of the word "faggot" as part of the larger right wing mode of using gender stereotypes as a means of attack. It's telling that, on Fox News, Young America's Foundation spokesman Jason Mattera defended Coulter by saying she wasn't smearing gay people. Rather, "she was basically calling John Edwards a wuss, that he was a girlie-man, and that if he were elected president he would probably embolden Al Qaeda to attack us." Ah, well that's just so much better, isn't it? The smear wasn't at gay men, but simply an equation of the feminine wit...
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George Will's "Facts and Faith" Framing
2007-03-06 05:05:00
In a recent column from Newsweek, George Will takes on the topic of global warming, arguing that we don’t really know that human activity is causing global warming, and even if it was, we don’t know that this would be a bad thing.Will’s piece provides a good example of how someone can frame an argument with only a few choice words. In this case, Will carefully chooses his terminology in the early part of the column to insinuate that he’s the rational, sober voice of reason, while those who warn of global warming’s dangers base their beliefs on unsubstantiated beliefs.We see this even in the title of the column itself, “Inconvenient Kyoto Truths.” These are the “truths” Will sets out to present to us, as opposed to the unthinking dogma of those on the other side.Will’s first swipe at the idea of global warming as established fact is his line, “Many senators and other experts in climate science say we must ‘do something’ about global warming.” By ironically...
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The Buck Stops in Baghdad
2007-02-21 02:52:00
Let’s start our rhetorical tinkering by putting President Bush’s address to the nation last month up on the rack and take a look at what makes it tick (or not).I thought one approach that might be interesting is to do an analysis based on the actual word used in the speech. Word counting by itself is only marginally helpful when evaluating a text, but we’ve got some help in the form of a computer program called “Diction” created by rhetorical scholar Roderick Hart.I won’t go into a long explanation of how the program works, but in essence, it counts up and categorizes words in a text, then compares the number of words in each category with averages based on typical texts of the genre.For example, one of the categories the program uses is “self-reference.” Any words that would refer to the speaker/writer of the text fall into this category (e.g., “I,” “me,” “myself,” etc.).After counting up these words, Diction tells you whether the text you’re analyzing...
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The Rhetoric Garage
2007-02-21 00:30:00
Hi everyone, and welcome to my second rhetoric-themed blog. A special welcome to those of you following me here from my previous blog, The Counterpoint. I hope to see some familiar faces (metaphorically speaking) here.This is just a brief post to introduce the idea behind this blog. What I do here is look at examples of public discourse and analyze them from a variety of rhetorical perspectives, with the goal of both shedding some light on the texts I look at and also making "rhetorical criticism" something that's interesting, fun, and purposeful for a wide audience. I'm not interested in creating miniature versions of graduate seminar papers here. Rhetoric is a practical art, and so should rhetorical criticism. Ideally, this blog will play a small role in bridging the gap between the ivory tower of academia and the world in which we all live.The title is meant to capture this idea. As a mechanic will put up a car on a lift, examine it, take it apart, diagnose any problems, and mo...
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