This article excavates how style in writing was represented and taught in the under-investigated mid-twentieth century. I trace four editions of the textbook "Modern Rhetoric" (1949-1979), authored by Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren; I detail how the book was surprisingly innovative for the time, despite its eventual re-entrenchment to a…

This essay provides an account of The Ohio State University's (OSU) rhetoric department during the tenure of Joseph Villiers Denney, arguing that he appropriated and repurposed national trends in education and rhetoric in ways that complicate the narrative of rhetoric and composition's decline in the late nineteenth century. In this essay, the…

When scholars write about their research in writing programs' archives, they often face the ethical question of whether to name the administrators who were involved in documents. The author identifies and provides examples of three basic orientations to this issue, which he calls overt-historical, covert-qualitative, and hybrid-institutional.…

By revisiting the work of the Black Caucus and the radical rhetorics connected to Black Power and the black radical tradition, in this essay the author hopes to rebuild a frame where the picture of an African-American-vernacularized paradigm for critical literacy and social justice can emerge. She revisits the twinning of "Black Power/Black…

Argues that Richard Whately was a significant force in shaping the model for teaching writing that has been dominant in the last 90 years. (Author/RL)

Relates the ideas and contributions of a nineteenth century teacher and college president to the history of the field of rhetoric. (JL)

Examines the classical rhetoric revival that occurred in American English departments in the 1950s and 1960s. Identifies rhetorician Richard M. Weaver as a leader of this "First Rhetorical Awakening." Argues that Weaver's work draws a connection between philosophical rhetoric and cultural criticism. Encourages further exploration of the…

Looks at the use of the term "nigger" in "Huckleberry Finn" as central to the text. Regards the novel as a kind of meditation on the word "nigger" and as an attempt by Twain to explore the construction and maintenance of racial identity. Examines the present historical and pedagogical moment as part of the reception…