DEFINING RHETORIC THROUGH THE AGES

Defining Rhetoric Through The Ages



Defining Rhetoric Through The Ages

Rhetorical theory is related to education systems since first Greek rhetoric schools. In Iliad the heroes and make substantial speeches. In later literature tragedy uses speeches. Western cultures, influenced by classical Greek and Roman traditions developed the use of oratory to significant importance in politics, religion and legal affairs. First documents of rhetoric are in Europe written in Greek language. (Clements 2008:16-55)

Greek notions of rhetoric reflect several different views of nature and beliefs about the ends of rhetoric. The four basic Greek models, which see rhetoric as variously manipulative or consensus seeking or dialectical in Plato or problematic in Aristotle persist throughout the history of rhetoric, one or another dominating at different times. (Crook 2006:95-85)

Isocrated called his rhetoric the art of discourse considered himself a teacher of philosophy, and directed himself to training the forms of discourse in which the mind expresses itself. Famous teachers called Sophists were Gorgias and Isocrates. This rhetoric emphasized stylistic ornamentation and auditory effects that also influenced the grow of the theoretical terminology.11 Style is a significant component of persuasion as a purpose. Style involves a unique kind of thinking with a distinctly limited range of applicability. Style includes emphases on personal appeal, emotional argumentation, and a limited form of logical demonstration quite distinct from scientific or dialectical discourse.

The years in which medieval rhetoric was taught and practiced extended from approximately the fall of the Roman Empire in the late 9th century to the uncovering of the complete work of Quintillian in the late 15th century. Because of this long period medieval rhetoric slowly developed and was shaped and reshaped by different scholars trying to interpret the works of the ancients. With the invention of the codex book, and especially with the invention of the printing press, notions of closure and completeness develop that are unthinkable in orality and difficult at best in manuscript culture. Visionaries wrote in the middle ages mystic literature. (Gombrich 2005:12-20)

Rhetoric and poetic, taste and sublimity came from Longinus. Longinus' On the Sublime is decoded according to the categories of Ciceronian rhetoric. To express his tastes, the author of On the Sublime resorts to a forceful and en iastic rhetoric that aims more at carrying the reader away than at persuading him. This style also provides a clue to his personality and defines On the Sublime as an original piece of literary criticism.64 Longinus sides with Cicero against the atticists (Lysias). His Greek word pathos or extasy referrs to the Latin movere. Within the limits of this common ground, Longinus attempts to differentiate himself from Cicero by favoring a sublime marked by brevity, rather than by copia. In the eyes of Quintilian or of the Renaissance, such an atttempt is pure illusion. By boxing in the most spectacular aspect of the copia, Longinus displeases all those who wish to further support the role of the structures of speech. Philodemus wrote a rhetorical handbook later ...