Critical analysis of vocabulary, imagery, and rhetoric in business texts shows that higher education is adopting a free-market discourse depicting the academy in terms of a knowledge industry or revenue generator in which intellectual resources are "leveraged" and knowledge is a "commodity." This discourse is characterized as management centered,…

Suggests the best method of teaching short fiction is maieutic. Argues that students need to strengthen their thinking ability and can most effectively do so by responding to exploratory questions that relate to analysis. Suggests that the questions must be thoughtful, specific rather than general, and phrased in a way to encourage response. (SG)

Describes how "The Garden of Forking Paths" presents teaching challenges that ultimately yield benefits worth the effort for students and instructors. Discusses a three-tiered approach: spy story, family history and character, and ideas of time and timelessness. Concludes that the three layers provide a structure to get the discussion started and…

Describes a 4-week unit of study that focuses on Shakespeare's "The Tempest," a text that has been especially controversial in today's climate of increased multicultural awareness. Involves students in a larger conversation about the possibilities for reading and interpreting literature and prepares them to write mature analyses of the…

Develops a rhetorical account of how experts move fluidly among disciplinary criteria and use paradigms more as strategies than constraints. Analyzes how E. O. Wilson projects his sociobiology into several discourse frames, each presuming a different audience, purpose, and persona for himself as expert. Suggests that Wilson eludes disciplinary…

Explores the effects of terrorism by approaching it as a persuasive form of communication rather than a dysfunctional sociological act. Describes the rhetorical functions of terrorism, evaluates the persuasive appeal of a mediated narrative, and applies narrative theory to analyze the 1985 TWA Flight 847 hijacking and its terrorist spokesman. (KEH)

Examines Biblical apocalyptic theory and secular apocalyptic literature. Proposes a new theory of apocalypticism in secular public discourse derived from those two major theories. Provides examples of apocalypticism in secular public discourse. (MM)

Describes AT&T's long distance service interruption in New York on September 17, 1991, as a serious threat to its corporate image. Analyzes the advertising actions taken by AT&T to restore its image. Discusses three primary strategies developed in the advertising: mortification, plans for correction, and bolstering. (HB)

Examines Mario Cuomo's 1984 speech at Notre Dame University in which Cuomo explains the contradiction between his abortion policy and the teachings of the Catholic Church through an appeal to the separation between church and state. Evaluates his construction of the role of religious rhetoric in public policy. (SR)

Examines the rhetoric of Margaret Thatcher, indicating how Thatcherism intensified existing ideological tensions within the British context; how Thatcherism constructed the public issue of "terrorism" in Northern Ireland as an "epic tragedy"; and how such a construction materially shifted and ensnared commitments to…

Identifies and discusses divergent synecdochal representations of the handgun as vital to both the construction and maintenance of competing social realities (handgun as threatened liberty and handgun as threatened life) in the debate over the Brady Bill. Demonstrates how such representations serve as divergent rhetorical constructs for competing…

Argues that the use of evidentials illuminates differences between arguments written by experienced academic writers and those written by student writers. Reveals differences in the epistemological stance underlying both groups. Analyzes discursive examples by both groups. (HB)

Studies the tone of essays published in the journal "PMLA" from 1975 to 1988. Notes that most are adversarial, and many are sarcastic or condescending. Suggests a sameness within the argumentation that may reflect writers' academic socialization. Concludes that some feminist writers dislike the adversary model and do not employ it. (SG)

Develops a conception of science as a complex series of cultural practices mediated in an through discourse. Uses a case study of the cold fusion controversy to demonstrate that internal scientific practices cannot explain adequately the eventual closure of the debate and that those explanations are found in the rhetorical practices of…

Presents 10 children's books that are particularly rich for analytical classroom discussions. Considers how studying literary theory is a way of becoming more aware of how people read and interpret what they read. Concludes that these books are good reading and good vehicles for introducing critical theories. (SC)