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…

This article presents a detailed case study analysis of oral and written language expressed by Jacqueline Meyer, a teacher of elementary English Language Learners (ELL),as she struggled to navigate the current political terrain with her students. Ms. Meyer's district adopted commercial materials and increased the amount and substance of testing…

This article offers a philosophical contribution to recent debates about the assessment of quality in educational research. It shows how criticisms of the quality of educational research--pointing to its failure to meet epistemic criteria of rigour and practical criteria of relevance--are an inevitable manifestation of the flawed assumption that…

Recent work examining and expanding traditional accounts of a virtue has been used as the foundation for a virtue-based approach to epistemology. A similar approach to aesthetics yields some striking features, which coincide with contemporary philosophical concerns about the nature and definition of art. Those writing on virtue-based epistemology…

Advocates studying classical rhetorics and rhetorical theorists in terms of the questions asked rather than just the answers given. (RL)

Investigates differing perspectives on the role played by rhetoric in the acquisition of knowledge. Concludes that rhetoric, if viewed as an act of striving for audience adherence and consensus, can be a tool of critical inquiry which moves its practitioners (scientists, philosophers, or public communicators) toward apprehending reality. (PD)

This paper subjects "A Declaration on Learning" published in the UK in 2000 to a critical review. A brief synopsis of the text is followed by a commentary discourse drawing upon critical discourse analysis (Fairclough 2001) and incorporating meta content analysis, rhetorical analysis and genre analysis. Conclusions are drawn related to the…

Considers Stephen North's recent journal article, "The Making of Knowledge in Composition." Criticizes North's perception that education practitioners have private knowledge regarding what works in class and his implication that all practitioner claims to knowledge are equally valid. Argues that such claims are best verified by dialectic…

Describes a seven-week critical-inquiry unit in a writing course for college sophomores that studies the 1953 Rosenberg trial. Uses this unit to illustrate the importance of dissonance in learning development, and how rhetorical inquiry in Kenneth Burke's concept of "perspective by incongruity" leads to critical inquiry and deeper…

Discusses Kenneth Burke's notion of "symbolic action" as applied to texts and how it mediates perceptions. Discusses some ways to teach students to get outside their own perspectives and notice what they are overlooking (thus teaching Burke's "perspective by incongruity"). (SR)