Course Description
The course will survey the various roles played by rhetoric in human communities. A variety of cases and theories will be employed to illuminate the operations of rhetoric in a variety of contexts and applications.
Athena Title
RHETORIC/SOCIETY
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in SPCM 2200
Semester Course Offered
Offered every odd-numbered year.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
A primary goal of this course is to acquaint students with the history of public discourse, especially, but not exclusively, in western civilization. The course will survey the oratory of Pericles, Demosthenes, Cicero, Augustine, Elizabeth I, Burke, Webster, Lincoln, A. Grimke, C. Stanton, Roosevelt, Churchill, M. L. King, Kennedy, Reagan, as well as the discourses of various contemporary figures. As they study the texts of such messages, students will examine various ideas about the nature of public communication that have informed rhetoric in the periods examined. The primary teaching strategy of the course is to acquaint students with such techniques of rhetoric as invention, disposition, persuasive proof, and audience analysis that are reflected in the history of this art. Special attention will be paid to building understanding of the many ways in which rhetoric shapes the values, purposes, attitudes, and beliefs of human communities. Students will complete research assignments which will involve computer-based research and paper preparation. Students will consider the moral and ethical implications of a variety of communication situations.
Topical Outline
I. The emergence and role of the rhetoric in classical antiquity. II. Democracy, citizenship, and the role of speech. III. The rhetoric of leadership, politics, and the presidency. IV. Resistance and social change: public communication in movements.
Syllabus