Poetry is about the experience of meaning as well as the meaning of experience. To read a poem is to feel one's way into the inner workings of its language, rather than to peer through that speech to an extractable truth. Most students of literature today have difficulty in grasping the performative or rhetorical dimensions of the texts with which…

A recent book that appeared a few years ago, "How Early America Sounded" by historian Richard Cullen Rath, connects well with much of the new, exciting, interdisciplinary and rhetorical research that the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) have supported, promoted, and…

If one puts together "China Is Unhappy" and the book "China Can Say No" of 13 years ago, one is quite likely to get the impression that "China's nationalism is heating up." "China does not wish to lead anyone, and should only think of leading itself"--those are the words printed on the back cover of…

The book "China Is Unhappy" that made the list of best sellers not so long ago is blowing like an icy wind in spring and is poisoning the nation's mental state as though laden with a virus of unhappiness. Those who are most susceptible to it are groups of underage persons with mentalities that are still fragile and young people who have…

Does rhetoric have a place in the discourse of human rights? Without certain reply, as the dilemmas of defining, claiming, and promoting human rights appear both to include and exclude the rhetorical gesture, this question invites inquiry into the preface of the contemporary human rights regime, the moment of the aftermath that provokes a struggle…

It is contended that in Harvey Pegues's essay on objectivism and constructivism in the summer 2007 issue of "The Educational Forum", Pegues conducted an intellectual discourse in which legitimate or good-faith disagreement was not an option, and disparaged and imputed the negative motives with which he disagreed. This article responds by pointing…

In this article, the author argues that Emerson repudiated the formalism of nineteenth century belletristic, mechanistic, reason-centered, American rhetoric influenced by Hugh Blair. Instead Emerson promoted a rhetoric with imagination at its center, which calls for civic duty. (Contains 33 notes.)

In this article, the authors comment on Douglas Downs and Elizabeth Wardle's "Teaching about Writing, Righting Misconceptions." As Downs and Wardle note, a one-year academic writing course will not prepare students to write in all fields, and evidence suggests limitations on the transfer of skills. The authors agree, in addition, that the study of…

Study abroad has become, at least rhetorically, a core element in U.S. post-secondary education. For those who practice study abroad and have dedicated themselves to leading students, managing programs, or theorizing the role of study abroad in its relationship to the academy generally, the meaning of their work is powerfully shaped by rhetorical…

Examines the experimental program initiated by Albert Michelson at the end of the nineteenth century through a literary analysis of its reception. Provides various interpretations of the failed experiments by science commentators over a period of decades. (HB)

Investigates the uses of the rhetorical strategy of identification by John McPhee in his novel, "Coming into the Country." Describes the technique articulated by Kenneth Burke as identification. Identifies three of Burke's techniques in McPhee's prose. (HB)

Explores the concept of a rhetoric of textual feminism. Defines the concept and discusses its functions by citing Virginia Woolf and Kenneth Burke. Argues that a rhetoric of textual feminism reveals the emotional, and critiques Woolf's "Three Guineas" to reread the emotional. (HB)

In a collaborative effort in teaching literary analysis, two professors aimed to make the usually seamless act of reading visible and ideologically bound by emphasizing the constructed nature of interpretation. A course was pieced together that asked questions about literature, that assumed that both students and teachers are subjects constructed…

Ghosts haunt the school curriculum. Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" provides a starting point for thinking about these curriculum ghosts. In the Preface, he states that he has "endeavoured in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea". In this article, the author seeks to raise the ghost of an idea, and to…

The long career of a single college professor reflects the way the entire profession has been shaped over the past several decades. Edward Corbett began his teaching career in 1948 at Creighton University, where he taught five courses per semester. His background in rhetoric derived from his graduate education at the University of Chicago, where…