The Origins and Early History of Rhetoric (31-48)

Rhetoric: The planned use of symbols to achieve goals

Historical beginnings of rhetoric are hard to pin down However Western rhet can be trace all the way back to Homeric writings 9th century B.C. 

Richard Enos’ three functions of discourse re Homer

1.      Heuristic:  discourse’s capacity for discovery, facts, insights, even self awareness

a.       Essential to the inventive process, the means of discovering to means to effectively express ones self.

2.      Eristic: Discourse’s ability to express, captivate, to argue, or to injure

a.       The inherent power of language itself

3.      Protreptic:  The possibility for persuading others to think as the rhetor thinks, to act as he wishes them to act

a.       the realization of discourse’s power to turn or direct human thought

The three functions were recognized centuries before they were applied to the planned, systematic study of rhetoric.  If we see an human awareness of these linguistic functions as primal, we can see rhetoric, itself, as the exploitation (or at least organization) of our human proclivity toward language.  Note the possible metaphor of body-building here.

Note: this sort of metalinguistic thought, this use of language to understand its own power was recognized (and discussed) centuries before they were incorporated into an authoritative and systematic study of rhetoric.   The conscious discovery of discourse’s fundamental power was a turning point in human progress/history.

History

  • The systematic study of rhetoric probably began on the island of Syracuse 467 B.C.
  • Corax taught judicial disputation re property claims after Hieron’s death
  • Corax’s systemaic teaching approach quickly spread to Athens and other city-states
  • These professional speakers and teachers became the SOPHISTS (highly profitable)
  • People versed in rhet were highly employable – thus rhet was a part of good education
  • 5th century BC saw the move from aristocracy to democracy – rhet, of course, would be of great importance in democratic culture.  Democracy created the need for a new kind of education.
  • Growth of middle class as aristocratic power fades.  Education/erudition become sklls of power for anyone – class barriers are beginning to fall.  Democracy and rhetoric allow a broader distribution of power.
  • Skill in persuasive speaking becomes profoundly important to political power. It becomes imperative that young Greek men learn to listen, understand and speak well
  • The POLIS defined Greek culture.  The difference between Greek and barbarian.  The polis was developed and maintained through rhetorical principles that drove the democratic process – essentially a language driven community fed by persuasion and debate – Rules, Laws, Rights, Political and Financial concerns.  Education rises beyond technical skills
  • The Sophists offered free men an education in the principles of rhetoric – esp in inventing arguments and persuading others to accept them – an education in the effective use of reason (not previously available – this was new stuff!  We can see the symbiosis between culture and education clearly)  Sophism becomes the key to political and economic success.
  • Sophism/rhetoric’s rise in the Greek city-states (and education)  reveals a profound cultural change inasmuch as the general belief that the gods shaped human destinies was fast becoming displaced with the reality that human discourse shapes human destinies. ”Human destiny is shaped by human rationality and persuasive speech.” (Note here the power of social construction and the nature of truth)

THE SOPHISTS (34)

5th /4th century -- Rhetoric as a systematic study was developed by the Sophists (sophos = wise or skilled)

Three types of education:  Speechwriting, Teaching, public speaking

What they taught: 

  • Along with persuasion per se, Sophists taught arete variously defined as the principles of success, virtue, personal excellence, all of the qualities of a natural leader . . .
  • Many Greeks felt arete could not be taught – but was the product of up-bringing or a natural gift.  A lot of this had to do with the sophists being uninvited foreigners too
  • Generally, sophists taught persuasion as rhetorical empowerment for political or legal purposes.  Personal growth and power of others through language (the oi poli often saw these people in the same light as we see exploitative lawyers today)

Methods:   Basic assumption – Truth comes from the clash of ideas

Dialectic (dialektike) – inventing arguments for and against a proposition.  Protagoras taught students to make the worst case look better

Endoxa – statements that are widely believed or seen as highly probable. (Like love is more important than money or personal safety is more important than human rights!) Arguments would begin with these.   One set of students would defend he premise while others would use another widely accepted premise to challenge the first one.  (Devil’s advocate)  The meeting of the two arguments would push forward a dialectic that would bring a better view of the truth.

Well-skilled sophists – those who could argue wll either side – became experts in judicial settings as hired advocates

Dissoi Logoi – contradictory arguments.  Sophists believed that strong arguments could be made for or against any claim.

Kairos – “Rhetoric’s search for relative truth rather than absolute certainty.”  Situationalism and context define an opportune moment or situation from which to argue.

From the perspective of kairos, the truth depends upon factors such as time, opportunity, and circumstances .  Opposing arguments (dissoi logoi) relative to the elements of kairos would move an argument forward through dialectic until the truth was found or created in the process, i.e., jury verdicts.  In this sense, sophism was a play on truth rather than the exacting search for a positive truth.

Epideixis – A Speech prepared for a formal occasion

Because of the situational ethics nature of the sophists, many Greeks felt that they and their students didn’t have a real understanding of jusice and virtue as much as thet understood and used word-play to their and/or their clients’ advantage.  In this sense truth wasn’t necessarily discovered as much as it was created through dialectic argument.  In this sense, sophism was seen as debased exploitation – again, like we see lawyers today. 

 

Why the Sophists were controversial (36)

  • Sophists ability to manipulate “truth” generated great suspicion
  • Seen as a dangerous element in society
  • Plato attacks sophism (esp with Gorgias)
  • Plato: “[rhet is] a knack of flattering words”
  • Me: Yet modern rhetoricians use sophistic argumentation more so than platonic “philosophical inquiry” which can be seen as evidence of our own cultural view that truth is not a static concern as much as cultural collaboration
  • 1.Sophists like Gorgias and Protagoras charge huge fees for their services –thus made large personal fortunes through advocacy/rhetoric
  • 2. Sophists threatened aristocratic class system by offering the means to  great fortune (beyond that of physical skilled labor) to anyone who could pay the price of education – rhet becomes a means for the middle class to enter into the political dialogue
  • 3. Sophists were displaced foreigners (not from Athens) Because of their worldliness Sophists saw truth as relative to place and culture.  This relativistic view of truth freed them from the moralistic and cultural constraints that might have bound their opponents in debate judicial arguments.  Thus can see the sophists as skeptics who were suspicious of spiritual axioms and social mores
  • 4. Sophistic view of truth was not found in transcendent sources but in
    the clash of arguments.”  Thus we see how the definition of truth itself becomes a tautological exercise.  Plato, for example, sees truth as transcendent, as a universal, pre-existent good to be discovered, rather than created through dialogue. (38) Sophists saw justice as a product of nomos a concept of social construction as the foundation of law (rather than a set “categorical imperative” that we must all aspire to)  They challenged themos – the law or authority set down by kings, physis – natural law and logos (Plato) a transcendent source of absolute truth. 

 

Gorgias of Leontini  485 – 380 BC

Practiced during the time of Protagoras

Three part formulation of skeptical philosophy:

1.  Nothing exists

2.  If something did exist, we could not know it

3.  If we could know that something existed it, we would not be able to communicate it to anyone else.

 

Reality exists only in the human psyche and therefore can be influenced/changed through language, linguistic manipulation--A very interesting and, at that time, original concept akin, somewhat, to magic.  The right words presented correctly can have immense results.   G was connected with magical incantations that could heal or destroy 

Gorgias actually saw rhetoric as a means of deception by “massaging the psyche” A “way to make men slaves through persuasion (pietho) rather than force.”

George Kennedy suggests that Gorgias saw rhetors as a sort of psychagogos,  a leader of souls through incantation – a sort of poet-leader or –king.

Gorgias uses not only words but cadence, rhyme, sounds, etc, to set forth a sort of hypnotic incantation – very pleasurable and efficient for his time.  Truth here is not based upon fact or proofs but simply in pleasing the auditors on multiple psychological levels.

 

Encomium on Helen:

A lesson in persuasion:

Persuades that Helen is not at fault for leaving Menaleaus

Four reasons:

It was the will of the gods

she was taken by force

she was seduced by words

she was overtaken by love

 

  • Contemporary Greek culture believed that poetry was of divine origin passed over to rhetoric’s own power to impassion and influence the listener. 
  • Gorgias believed that rhetoric worked its “magic” by arousing feelings like fear, pity, and longing. (see 41)
  • Note the definition of chiasmus: the “making of an x” in a statement—A rhetorical device that takes its name from reversing the elements of parallel clauses forming an x  in a sentence (ask not what your country can do . . .  but what . . .)
  • antithesis: oppositional ideas in a sentence or paragraph

 

Protagoras

“Man is the measure of all things; of things that are not they are not, that they are not; of things that are, that they are.”  This concept embodies the idea of collaborative knowledge and kairos.  Relativism

Known as the first person to systematize erisitic argument

 Resolution of important issues (truth) can be found in the clash of arguments (again – dialectic)

 

Isocrates

The first great teacher of rhetoric:  Cicero adapted and admired Isoc’s methods of teaching oratory/rhet in his writings and it became the standard of excellence in rhetoric education in Europe until the renaissance

  • Born 50 years after G and P (436 – 338 BC)
  • Contemporary (and rival to some extent) of Plato – both studied under Socrates. But Isocrates also studied under Gorgias
  • Yet Plato refered to Isocrates as “a youth of great promise” in his Phaedrus
  • While P and G were itinerant foreigners who taught sophistic rhet for a living, Isocrates was a true Athenian citizen who began the first official school of Rhetoric in Athens.  He became extremely wealthy
  • Whether or not Isocrates was a true sophist is debateable.  After all, he wrote, Against the Sophists wherein  he criticizes the early sophists, but he still considered himself a sophist in principle.
  • One of the first rhetors to use the written word . . .  pamphlets of his speeches.Thus he is seen as one of the first to create a literary form of oratory.  The implications here are
  • Isocrates concentrated on teaching young politicians (future leaders) to make wise ans efficient decisions and felt that he was, indeed, the teacher of the nation because of this. 
  • His teaching practices (pedagogy) became foundations for other schools of rhet.  Sets the standard.
  • It seems we must see Isocrates as a sort on liminal sophist inasmuch as he inserts a sense of responsibility into his teachings.  Two main themes were:
    • Thematic: requires that rhetoric concentrate on significant matters (rather than the entertainment-prone that early sophists taught)
    • Pragmatic: requires that rhetoric make a positive contribution to the life of the audience (rather than the self-centered exploitative use of language of past teachers)
  • Isocrates sees the ability to persuade others as the basis of human existence (important to KB studies, i.e., symbolic action . . .l) see  quote bottom of pg 44
  • Isocrates based his highly nationalistic and moralistic rhetoric on three factors:
    • Natural talent
    • Extensive practice
    • Education
    • He also insisted that his students be highly moral (ethos)
  • Arete = virtue  cannot be taught
  • Sees language through the lens of a medicine metaphor (pharmakon)  Like Plato.
  • Rhet should be used to advance Greek ideals and moral behavior and that education would create sound citizens who would use the power of language for the common good
  • Advocate of pan-Hellenism, the unity of all Greek city-states against common foe (Persia)