RHETORIC AS REALITY CONSTRUCTION

CHARLES WILLIAM KNEUPPER

A Dissertation

Submitted to the Graduate School of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

December 1973

/Approved by Doctoral Committae: //¿T

Department of Speech

Graduate School Representative

BOWM nSEEH sum UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Iq

© 1974

CHARLES WILLIAM KNEUPPER

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED )b

ABSTRACT

This study developes a ’’new1’ philosophy of rhetoric. It is premised on an examination of classical rhetorical theory and contemporary rhetorical theory. It is based on a dynamic view of language function. Ultimately it rests on the symbol creating and symbol using capacities of the human mind.

This study surveys the history of the classical rhetorical tradition and the direction of contemporary rhetorical theory. It investigates the relationship between language and thought, perception, and action. It views rhetoric as the process through which reality constructs are formed and shared. Social reality is a product of this rhetorical process. Social reality is a human creation. Rhetoric is the process through which it is created, maintained or transformed. •o

When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies. Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams, this may be madness. To seek treasure, where there is only trash, this may be madness. Too imuch sanity may be madness. But maddest of all is to see life as it is and not as it should be.

THE MAN OF LA MANCHA DEDICATED TO:

Marvin Troy Hunn

Sally Miller Gearhart

Janis Lynn Hilbert

Carl William Jeske

Gary and Juanita Eckles <1

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ...... iii

CHAPTER I: THE DEVELOPMENT AND DECLINE OF THE

CLASSICAL RHETORICAL TRADITION ...... 1

INTRODUCTION ...... 2

CLASSICAL RHETORIC'S RISE TO PREEMINENCE ...... 3

THE MIDDLE AGES: DIFFUSION AND DECLINE ...... 5

RENAISSANCE: THE DISMEMBERMENT OF RHETORIC ...... 7

THE REVIVAL OF RHETORIC ...... 9

RHETORIC'S REVIVAL UNDER THE FIELD OF SPEECH ...... 10

INADEQUACY OF THE CLASSICAL TRADITION...... 14

A NEW BEGINNING...... 17

CHAPTER II: DIRECTION IN CONTEMPORARY RHETORIC ... 23

I. A. RICHARDS ...... 24

RICHARD M. WEAVER...... 26

KENNETH BURKE ...... 29

CURRENT SCHOLARSHIP ...... 32

TRENDS IN CONTEMPORARYR HETORIC ...... 33

CHAPTER III: LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT ...... 39

WHORFIAN HYPOTHESES ...... 40

EMPIRICAL SUPPORT FOR LINGUISTIC DOMINANCE ...... 47

RELATED PERCEPTION RESEARCH ...... 49

IMPLICATIONS OF LINGUISTIC RELATIVITYAAND LINGUISTIC DOMINANCE FOR RHETORIC...... 52

LANGUAGE AND RHETORICAL THOUGHT ...... 54

LANGUAGE AND ACTION...... 55

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 56 11

CHAPTER IV: SOCIAL REALITY CONSTRUCTION ...... 59

INTRODUCTION...... 60

REALITY...... 60

KNOWLEDGE AS HUMAN CONSTRUCTION...... 62

HUMAN ACTION AND REALITY CONSTRUCTS ...... 65

SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED REALITY...... 69

THE REFLEXIVITY OF SOCIAL REALITY...... 72

UNIVERSES OF DISCOURSE ...... 78

ALTERNATIVE REALITY CONSTRUCTIONS ...... 81

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CLASSIFICATION...... 84

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS ...... 85

CHAPTER V: REALITY MAINTENANCE AND

RECONSTRUCTION...... 91

INTRODUCTION...... 92

UNIVERSES OF DISCOURSE: FURTHER EXPLICATION...... 93

REALITY MAINTENANCE ...... 99

REALITY RECONSTRUCTION...... 103

RHETORICAL VISION...... 109

SUMMARY...... 110

APPENDIX...... 114

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH ...... 115

BIBLIOGRAPHY 116 ill

INTRODUCTION

The purpose of this dissertation is to provide an initial

development of a "new” philosophy of rhetoric. This philosophy which views rhetoric as reality construction is implied by some contemporary rhetorical theory, but is unrecognized in classical rhetorical theory. The philosophy is based on a consideration of the symbol creating and symbol using capacities of the human mind. It views language as the dominant social symbolism which channels thought and directs action. Social reality is a product of human symbolic interaction. Social reality is possible only insofar as symbols are shared betwean people and utilized to direct thought and action. Through rhetoric, symbols are created and communicated. Through rhetoric, social reality is created, maintained and transformed.

The philosophy being developed is "new” to rhetorical theory.

However, the insights of this philosophy are not without a strong intellectual tradition. Throughout the dissertation I will draw upon this tradition which includes scholarship in contemporary rhetorical theory, critical philosophy, philosophy of language, phenomenology, symbolic interactionism, general semantics, the sociology of knowledge, and socio- and psycholinguistics. CHAPTER I:

THE DEVELOPMENT AND DECLINE

OF THE

CLASSICAL RHETORICAL TRADITION 2

INTRODUCTION:

Rhetoric is an ancient and venerable art. In Western Civilization

its earliest theoretical formulation is attributed to Corax and Tisias,

Sicilian Greeks of the fifth century B.C. Yet the practice of Rhetoric

is primordial "since it belongs to speech and must have been practiced, o to some extent . . . wherever language existed." The critical formula­

tion of the Art was based on the observation of its practice. Referring

to critical formulation, Professor of Classics, George Kennedy indicates

that "in its origin and intention rhetoric was natural and good: it

produced clarity, vigor, and beauty, and it rose logically from the 3 conditions and qualities of the classical mind." The reliance of

ancient civilization on oral communication in a political system which

"operated through the direct speech of the citizens" produced an inter­

est in Rhetoric.^

Because Rhetoric was significant to both the individual and

society, it is not surprising that it received serious consideration

and criticism from Plato, defense from Aristotle, and expansion from

Cicero and Quintilian, to mention only major theorists. Because of

the relevance of rhetoric to the individual citizen in the conduct of

his political activities, it follows that rhetoric would play "the central role in ancient education.Edward P. J. Corbett,who traces

the history of classical rhetoric from the fifth century, indicates

that "during most of that time, rhetoric was a prominent, and for long

stretches the dominant, discipline in the schools.From it’s status in ancient education it seems reasonable to conclude that rhetoric was 3

generally valued as a useful and productive art.

Today, rhetoric (at least as a term) is not generally valued.

John H. Mackin suggests that:

Nowadays rhetoric is a bad word. If you want to put someone’s writing down, just call it rhe­ torical. If you want to deflate an opponent and reduce him to sputtering rage, dismiss his argu­ ments as mere rhetoric. The term today more often than not means fancy language concealing emptiness.?

The devaluation and consequent decline of rhetoric is an intriguing

phenomena. One which should immediately prompt the question: Why?

While a definitive analysis of this phenomena is beyond the scope

and purpose of this work, I would suggest that the phenomena may be

plausibly explained as a function of historical accident and flaws within the classical rhetorical tradition. In this chapter I shall

survey the development and decline of the classical rhetorical tradi­

tion and present a partial analysis of the theoretical basis of its

decline.

CLASSICAL RHETORIC'S RISE TO PREEMINENCE

Before considering the decline of rhetoric, let us briefly con­

sider the development of the classical rhetorical tradition. George

Kennedy suggests that despite slight deviations, "the history of ancient rhetoric is largely that of the growth of a single, great, 8 traditional theory to which many writers and teachers contributed."

Mentioning Aristotle, the anonymous author of the Rhetorica Ad Herennium,

Cicero, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the elder Seneca, Hermogenes,

Theophrastus, and Quintilian, Kennedy suggests that the works of these authors represented "a continuous evolving tradition. Constantly 4

revised and made more detailed, it remained unaltered in its essential

detail."9 it is Quintilian’s Institutiones oratoriae in which this

tradition finds "its most complete expression."I®

Quintilian's Institutiones oratoriae, usually translated Institutes

of Oratory is concerned with "the education of the perfect orator.

In this work, Quintilian implies that the end of education is the

training of the orator. Quintilian who was both a successful orator

and teacher, was appointed by Vespasian to the first endowed chair of

rhetoric at Rome. Corbett indicates that "the prestige of this endow­

ment made him the supreme authority on rhetoric of his time."1-2

Quintilian’s original contribution to rhetorical theory is based on

the fact "that he was the first to interpret the art of oratory as

including all that was necessary for the training of an orator from

his earliest years. Others before him had ignored the preliminary 13 stages; he first brought them within the sphere of rhetoric."

Yet, one may still wonder whether rhetoric's place in classical education was as pre-eminent as Quintilian would have it. Historical evidence indicates that it was. Professor H. I. Marrou in his classic work, A History of Education in Antiquity indicates this actual pre­ eminence. Referring to Hellenistic education, he writes:

For the very great majority of students, higher education meant taking lessons from the rhetor, learning the art of eloquence from him. This fact must be emphasized from the start. On the level of history Plato had been defeated: post­ erity had not accepted his educational ideas. The victor, generally speaking, was Isocrates, and Isocrates became the educator first of Greece and then of the whole ancient world. His success had been evident when the two were alive, and it became 5

more and more marked as the generations wore on. Rhe­ toric is the specific object of Greek education and the highest Greek culture.

Further, Marrou indicates that "In Rome as in Greece, rhetoric belonged

to the sphere of higher education, and was its chief manifestation."^

Thus, ¿.wewe may reasonably conclude that rhetoric held a position in

the educational system of antiquity roughly corresponding to the aims of its leading theorists.

THE MIDDLE AGES: DIFFUSION AND DECLINE

Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian are the core theorists of the classical rhetorical tradition. In one sense the tradition seems to be one of growth and expansion culminating in a dominance of rhetorical education. In another sense, rhetoric was being weakened in thia pro­ gression as "the Romans imitated from the Greeks an art of persuasion which gradually developed into an art often more concerned with . . . the secondary characteristics of rhetoric: not persuasion, but style and artistic effect. Even Quintilian in defining Rhetoric as "the science of speaking well"-'-^ contributes to elevating the theoretical importance of so-called secondary effects by diffusing the focus on the substance of rhetoric by emphasis on the aesthetic qualities of discourse.

Though there is a decline in rhetorical practice during the later stages of the Roman Empire, Rhetoric continues to play a promi­ nent role in education during the Middle Ages. Peter Dixon explains:

In the school curriculum of the Middle Ages, rhe­ toric, grammar and dialectic (or logic) composed the trivium--literally 'three roads'--the first group of subjects to be mastered. Together with the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy) these made up the seven Liberal Arts. Poetry was assigned sometimes 6

to the care of grammar, sometimes to rhetoric. The subjects of the trivium are of fundamental importance because they are all, including logic, arts of commu­ nication. °

Nonetheless, during the middle ages rhetoric is declining. Its status declines from the ultimate end of education to a preliminary stage of educational activity. Moreover, even within the trivium rhetoric held a position inferior to "scholastic logic.Donald L. Clark,

in his analysis of the decline of rhetoric during the middle ages indicates that:

The rhetorical treatises of the middle ages exhibit two phases*. On the one hand the earlier post-classi­ cal treatises composed by Martianus Capella, Cassiodorus, and Isidore, all inhibitants of the Mediterranean basin, are fairly close to the classical tradition of Quintilian. There weakness consists not in that they restricted rhe­ toric to style, but in that their whole treatment of rhe­ torical theory was compact, arid, and schematic. The second phase of medieval rhetoric is characteristic of a geographical position more remote from the center of classical culture. Thus it is in the rhetorical trea­ tises of England and Germany in the middle ages that rhetoric was to the |geatest extent restricted to a con­ sideration of style.

Clark goes on to indicate that by "the late middle ages rhetoric had 21 come to mean to all intents nothing more than style."

In explaining the cause of this shift in perspective from the classical tradition, Clark notes a historical accident. He explains,:

This perversion of rhetorical theory in the middle ages and early renaissance had resulted not from mere wrongheadedness on the part of the rhetoricians, but from the limited knowledge of classical tradition during the middle ages. Especially was this true in thSse parts of western Europe, such as England, which were remote from Mediterranean countries which better preserved the heritage of Greece and Rome. Moreover, the most important classical treatises on the theory of poetry--were almost unknown throughout the middle 7

ages, and the' rhetorical writings of Cicero and Quintilian were known only in fragments.22

While to call the development of rhetoric during the middle ages a

"perversion of rhetorical theory" may somewhat overstate the case, it

is clear that the classical rhetorical tradition was largely abandoned

during this period. In large part this seems due to the accident of

'losing" the works of the major theorists as a partial consequence of

the destruction of libraries during the fall of the Roman Empire.

RENAISSANCE: THE DISMEMBERMENT OF RHETORIC

Though Western Civilization was to experience a revival of classi­

cism and the rediscovery of major classical works during the Renaissance,

rhetoric never quite regained its former position. In part, because

even in the Renaissance the medieval perspective on rhetoric persisted.

For the people of the time "rhetoric was synonymous with stylistic

beauty" and rediscovered classics were interpreted in this light. J

Thus, even in the renaissance the medieval tradition of rhetoric as

style persisted.

Moreover this definition of rhetoric was reinforced by major educational theorists. Initially we have Rudolph Agricola who "in his treatise of logic, accepted the medieval tradition that rhetoric was concerned only with smoothness and ornament of speech and all that went toward captivating the ears, and straightway picked up all the serious purpose and thoughtful content of classical rhetoric which medieval rhetoric had abandoned, to hand them over to logic.Agricola was later overshadowed in light of a later more thorough reform of the education curriculum by the French logician, Peter Ramus.

Ramus’s Dialectique (1555) and Dialecticae Libri Duo (1556) and a 8

companion volume on rhetoric entitled Institutiones Oratoriae (1544) by Talon were widely influential in France and England "during the later 16th and the first half of the 17th century."— Ramus in "his revision of the art of rhetoric began with a radical reassignment of the anciently established five parts of the art of rhetoric--Invention,

Disposition, Elocution, Memory, and Delivery. He took invention, disposition, and memory away from rhetoric and gave them securely and unequivocally to dialectic, leaving to rhetoric proper only elocution

(that is, style) and delivery.Thus, the 17th century continues to view rhetoric as unrelated to substance, as ornamentation.

Interestingly, even in the area of style rhetorical practice abandons classical prescription during the 17th century. Such a view argued in Benedetto Croce’s Aesthetic

probably did a great deal to establish the 17th century in the mind of the early 20th as the moment ofs ahrhetoricaTvevenbiitihat had 'been:'Long overdue--the breakdown of the elaborate system of verbal artifice which had endured under the ?. name of "rhetoric" from classical times into the Renaissance. According to this view, the last and most preposterous phase of classical rhetoric occurs during the early 17th century in such baroque developments as Gongerism and Marinism on the continent and in the English parallel known as "metaphysical wit," the ex- travagent ingenuity in metaphor, pun, paradoxical conceit . . . After this phase there was no fur­ ther scope for the elaboration of ornamental rhe­ toric. The system collapsed.27

Further studies have indicated that "post-Baconian science and the Puri­ tan spirit of economic and practical tidiness" contributed to the decline of 9

stylistic rhetoric.

THE REVIVAL OF RHETORIC

Yet, just when one might expect the death of the rhetorical tradi­

tion, it seems to experience a significant revival through the 18th

and early 19th centuries. James L. Golden and Edward P. J. Corbett

indicate that "Hugh Blair, George Campbell, and Richard Whately

constituted the great triumvirate of British rhetoricians who came at the end of a long tradition of rhetoric which had its beginning in

fifth-century Greece. But these men did not so much terminate a tradi­

tion as initiate the period of modern or new rhetoric."29 Campbell,

Blair, and Whately "borrowed heavily from the classical tradition," but they do not merely repeat it. They make distinctive contributions, concerning rhetorical theory.However, it seems fair to suggest they also demonstrate a clear basis in the classical tradition.

Another development during the second half of the 18th century was the rise of the Elocutionary Movement. This movement "gave a O1 great impetus to the revived interest in delivery aspects of rhetoric."-3

These two revivals of interest in rhetoric seem to rise from differing rhetorical traditions. The New Rhetorics of Blair, Campbell, and

Whately are steeped in the classics but modify the tradition in light of the logical and psychological knowledge of their time. The Elocu­ tionary Movement seems to be more an extension of medieval rhetorical tradition than a classical revival. The tradition is important however, in that it has considerable impact generating both popular interest and 32 a place for itself in educational institutions in England and America. 10

The general condition of rhetorical education in the age seems reflected

in the 1819 comment of Edward T. Channing on becoming the Boylston Pro­

fessor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard: "It is the spirit of the age

to turn everything to account, and to let no good learning remain idle. 34 How is it that eloquence has gone behind-hand?" Though the classical rhetorical tradition was taught it was effected by the strong growth of

the elocutionary movement. Elocution "became'a required study in most 35 colleges, and remained so until late in the century." And "elocu- 36 tionary training became separated from rhetorical training." Further the classical rhetorical tradition was weakened when the classics became 37 a distinct and separate discipline. In these new classics departments the major classical rhetorical texts tended not to be studied. Finally,

"rhetorical training became increasingly linked with belletristic 38 study." Thus, it is understandable that "speech instruction became 40 the responsibility of departments of English language and literature."

Though this arrangement was understandable it proved to be unsatisfactory and speech fought and generally achieved separate departmental status in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

RHETORIC'S REVIVAL UNDER THE FIELD OF SPEECH

In the twentieth century Rhetoric appears to be on the rise again.

Gray indicates that "Rhetoric, which for centuries had been thought of essentially as a matter of either style or literary criticism, was by

1920 restored to its place as a substantial body of principles govern- 41 ing both oral and written discourse." The general rise of the pro­ fession was indicated by the formation of the National Association of 11

Academie Teachers of Public Speaking in 1914.42 The organization is

now known as the Speech Communication Association. The resuscitation

of the classical tradition is attributed to the Speech Department of

Cornell University, where in 1920 Alexander Drummond and Everett Hunt

established a seminar covering the rhetorical works of Aristotle, Cicero,

and Quintilian.43 The influence and strength of the classical rhetorical

tradition in the "newly" independent departments of speech is indicated by the scholarship of the time. Throughout the 1930’s and 1940's arti­ cles on or in the classical tradition dominate the Quarterly Journal of

Speech and Speech Monographes. In 1948, with the publication of Speech

Criticism by Lester Thonssen and A. Craig Baird, the classical tradition received it’s most comprehensive modern restatement. Their method modeled on classical theory became "the way" to do rhetorical criticism.

The classical perspective became the paradigm for scholarly research in the speech field. And yet today, this paradigm is the focal point of considerable controversy and disenchantment within the speech field.

A survey of recent journals published by national and regional speech communication associations no longer demonstrates a dominantly classi­ cal orientation. The current situation seems most aptly described as a period of pluralistic criticism. Scott and Brock forecast such a period without the emergence of a new paradigm gaining "the adherence that neo-aristotelianism had in the 1930’s and 1940’s."45

It should be noted that Scott and Brock are using the notion of paradigm in a special sense. That is the sense of paradigm intended 46 by Thomas S. Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolution. A 12

paradigm in this sense in not merely a research orientation, but

rather the dominant and widely accepted research perspective which

directs and organizes normal research in a discipline. As we have

seen the classical tradition has held that position from time to time.

One is inclined to wonder about the reasons for its current instability.

Though many reasons are involved, the most crucial is a loss of faith

in the paradigm, or in the words of Edwin Black the belief that "the

prevailing mode of rhetorical criticism is profoundly mistaken.Scott

and Brock, in a superficial analysis of the reasons contributing to the

loss of faith in the paradigm, list the partial application of the method

in actual criticism, an interest in the "socio-politic-economic environ­

ment" shifts interest away from "the traditional speaker orientation,"

a recognition that meaning is not in the message, and "a greater concern

for context and process," as reasons underlying the loss of faith in the 48 traditional perspective. Lawrence W. Rosenfield takes a somewhat

broader approach toward the breakdown of the traditional paradigm. He

suggests that:

It is symptomatic of a disturbance threatening all humanistic inquiry. Theology and political theory, for example, are today in disrepute in the academic world, passed on from teacher to student under the drumfire of behaviorism in a manner remineacent of Christians transmitting the faith in the Roman cata­ combs. Philosophy has for the most part reduced it­ self to two unsatisfying alternatives, the history of metaphysics and linguistic analysis. Rhetoric's survival is menaced by such Manichaen competitor as attitude change research and psycholinguistics.

If Rosenfield’s analysis is correct, then revitalizing rhetoric is an aspect of the general effort to restore humanistic studies to a place 13

of honor in social and academic circles. It is noteworthy that though

the classical tradition has been rejected as a paradigm, there remains

a considerable continuing interest in Rhetoric and a proliferation of

alternative theory.

How then shall one attempt to revitalize Rhetoric? What should be

done? Richard McKeon calls for Rhetoric to become a productive archi­

tectonic art. He argues that:

If rhetoric is to be used to contribute to the forma­ tion of the culture of the modern world, it should function productively in the resolution of new?pro­ blems and architectonically in the formation of new inclusive communities. Rhetoric can be used to pro­ duce a new rhetoric constructed as a productive art and schematized as an architectonic art. At a second stage the new rhetoric can be used to reorganize the subject-matter and arts of education and life. What rhetoric should be and to what conditions it is adapted are not separate theoretic questions but the single practical question of producing schemata to guide the use of the productive arts in transforming circumstances.50

For some McKeon's call for contemporary rhetoric to be a productive archi­

tectonic art may seem to be a nostalgic vision of returning rhetorical

theory to its historic place of preeminence. Aristotle viewed rhetoric as

a universal art dealing "within the realm of common knowledge, (with)

things that do not belong to any one science."^ McKeon indicates that

"Cicero enlarged rhetoric into a universal productive art" which was de­

signed to resolve "the basic problem of Roman culture, the separation of wisdom and eloquence, of philosophy and rhetoric."^2 Today, it seems that we again face a separation between wisdom and eloquénce, between knowledge

and the ability to communicate, between vision and the capacity to inspire

And the integration of these should be a goal of contemporary rhetoric.

Yet, today even though the public speech is still vastly important--we 14

have come to recognize that many other forms of communication have

rhetorical impact. A new rhetoric must build upon those factors

fundamental to the impact of all rhetorical interaction allowing for

specific sub-sets of theory to distinguish between different rhetori­

cal genres.

INADEQUACY OF THE CLASSICAL TRADITION

Without inadequacies in the classical theory it seems unlikely 53 that there would be a search for new directions in rhetoric. Further, though the ancients saw the need for the Conjunction of rhetoric and wisdom, traditional theory merely exhorts such usage and does not integrate rhetoric and wisdom into the fundamental principles of the theory. In our brief history we have noted that the decline of rhe­ toric came when it became identified with the style or delivery of discourse rather than the substance of discourse. This dichotomy is inherent in the classical theory. Style is repeatedly considered as ornament and embellishment in the classical treatises. Many of-the ancients realized that an "over-attention to the niceties of style is 54 the deterioration of our eloquence." Their treatment of style as ornament is based on a more fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of language and meaning. This is reflected in Quintilian's statement

"that every speech is composed of matter and words, and that as regards matter we must study .invention-,. as regards words, style.

It should be clear to the modern reader, that the speech is composed of words. The words shape and constitute the matter of the discourse..

Indeed without words, there can be no matter to tke discourse, since 15

there can be no discourse at all.

To examine a fundamental problem with classical theory, let us

consider the philosophy of language which underlies it. Though the

rhetorical works of ancient writers do not explicitly consider the

relation between language and meaning, the basic ancient understanding

of the relation* is illustrated in certain non-rhetorical works of

Aristotle. Aristotle writes in his De Interpretation that:

Spoken words are symbols of mental experience and written words are the symbols of spoken words. Just as all men have not the same writing, so all men have not the same speech sounds, but the men­ tal experiences, which these directly symbolize, are the same for all, as also are thosg things of which our experiences are the images.

Now it should be clear that the commonality of "mental experience"

which Aristotle posits is an inadequate view of the meaning of language.

It does not even meet the problem of translation. That is the fact

there are words in one language without equivalents in another language.

But, even more generally, J. Samuel Bois, a bilingual general seman-

ticist writes that "I don't see the same things, don't observe the

same events, when I change from my French to my English brain. I

inherited my French brain from my mother tongue, and to be at home in

English I had to be reborn culturally. Changing my language changes me as an observer. It changes my world at the same time."^

Aristotle bases the symbolic relationship on sense perception.

And he is taken to believe that "The sense organ is,; in fact, a means of discriminating form from matter and receiving it as wax receives 58 the imprint of a seal." Such a view postulates a rather passive 16

view of sense perception, that is the reception of the object of

sense is essentially a passive process which leaves an imprint of the

form of the object. Aristotle clearly indicates that "no one can

learn or understand anything in the absence of sense.Yet this view cannot explain the existence of non-referential words like justice and honor which are not directly perceived. Further, it presumes that perception of form will naturally occur. But,

If a primitive man is suddenly transplanted into a large modern city, many objects in this city remain invisible to him. Note that we do not say: "There are many things which he does not see," but "Many things remain invisible to him!' His existence as giver of meaning has not developed to the point where he is able to raiseethese figures from the horizon of the world.60

Again Aristotle's perspective on perception does not explain one's inability to perceive objects in an environment in which quite liter­ ally the stimuli are clearly reaching the sense organs. Moreover,

Aristotle's view of perception like "All Greek theories on this subject suffer from ignorance of the nervous system."61

Richard McKeon in discussing "Aristotle's Conception of Language and the Arts of Language" indicates that:

In the scientific use of language, when proposi­ tions and arguments are properly constructed, they are symbolic of ideas in the mind; and those ideas flow in a discourse comparable to the verbal dis­ course in which they are expressed.°2~

Yet this presumed flow of ideas is quite puzzling. If language is viewed as names or labels for mental experiences which must be based on sense perceptions which are imprints of an external reality, then neither communication or persuasion seem possible. How can language 17

communicate a particular event which was not experienced by the

receiver? How can saying "Tom is a thief" provide one with the

mental experience that seeing Tom commit a theft provides. If

sense perception is necessary for imprints which constitute the

mental experience to which language refers, then language could not

transform imprints based on sense perception, nor create imprints.

Thus in the absence of sense perception no new imprints, no persuasion

or communication is possible beyond the experience of the receiver.

One might argue that if the receiver has an imprint of Tom and an

imprint of the meaning of thief that the statement "Tom is a thief"

is within his experience. Yet, the imprint "Tom is a thief" is

clearly distinct from either the imprint "Tom" or "Thief" and a

strict interpretation of Aristotle does not allow for a merger or

blending of imprints independent of sense perception.

Aristotle’s view of language may be taken as representative of

the classical mind. Indeed, philosophers from "Aristotle to the

logical positivist" tend to view words "fundamentally as names"

referring to the things of external reality.1. Underlying If he entire

classical rhetorical tradition is a philosophy of language and meaning which is fundamentally inadequate. That is a philosophy of

language which cannot explain how linguistic communication and per­

suasion are possible.

A NEW BEGINNING

How should one begin the construction of a new rhetorical theory?

It seems obvious that the theory should begin with a philosophy of 18

language and meaning. John R. Stewart explains that:

Presupposition about language and linguistic meaning are essential to the foundation of speech- communication theory and pedagogy. If, for instance, a rhetorician, whether theorist, teacher, or critic views language as "the instrumentality by which speakers and writers embody their ideas. . ., "his understanding of communication probably rests on the assumption that language is something which happens after thought, and the task of the communi­ cator is to generate appropriate ideas and translate them into words. If, however, a rhetorician sees language as a special kind of psychological stimulus and meaning, he is likely to reduce communication to "the performance of a set of behaviors" or "the transmission or reception of messages" And if a rhetorician holds that language is a logical system governed by invariable rules, his communication analysis, evaluation, and instruction will emphasize the application of appropriate formulas instead of the study of how discourse works in a given situa­ tion. Because presupposition about the nature of language and meaning are crucial to one"s concept of speech-communication there is a continuing need to reexamine them in light of the latest and most useful philosophical analysis.

Thus, basing a rhetorical theory oh a clear and coherent philosophy of language will enable the theorist to see the role of that philo­

sophy in his theoretical predictions. Further, as Stewart indicates that the current presuppositions concerning language throughout the field of speech are inadequate, developing rhetorical theory from a more adequate philosophy of language offers not only a special improvement for rhetorical theory, but should provide direction throughout the field of speech communication. As a first step toward developing a more adequate philosophy of language one may examine the views on language of major theorists of contemporary rhetoric, 19

CHAPTER I END-NOTES

I-Lester Thonssen, A. Craig Baird, and Waldo W. Braden. Speech Criticism. New York: The Ronald Press, 1970, p. 40.

^Henry Coppee. Elements of Rhetoric. Philadelphia: Butter and Company, 1860, p. 15.

o George Kennedy. The Art of Persuasion in Greece. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963, p. 3.

4Ibid., p. 4.

5lbid., p. 7. For an extended examination of the place of rhetorical theory in ancient civilization see D. L. Clark, Rhetoric in Greco-Roman Education. New York: Columbia University Press, 1957.

^Edward P.J. Corbett. Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student. New York: Oxford University Press, 1965, p. 535.

7 John H. Mackin. Classical Rhetoric for Modern Discourse. New York: The Free Press, pp. 26-27.

^Kennedy, p. 9.

^Ibid., p. 13.

l^Ibid., p. 12.

1 ^-Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria. Translated by H. E. Butler. Caihbridge: Harvard University Press, 1969, Volume I, p. 9.

l^corbett, p. 542.

I^m. L. Clarke. Rhetoric at Rome. London: Cohen and West, Ltd., 1953, p. 120;

14 H. I. Marrou. A History of Education in Antiquity. Translated by George Lamb. New York: A Mentor Book, 1964. pp. 267-268.

•l^ibid. , p. 380.

■^George Kennedy. The Art of Rhetoric in the Roman World. Princeton Princeton University Press, 1972, p. xv.

17 Quintilian, p. 319. 20

1 ft °Peter Dixon. Rhetoric. London: Methuen and Company, 1971. pp. 45-46.

■^Corbett, p. 544.

20 D. L. Clark. Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance. New York: Columbia University Press, 1922, pp. 43-44.

21-lbid., p. 47.

22Ibid., p. 62.

23Ibid., p. 99.

2^Ibid., p. 56.

23william K. Wimsatt, Jr. and Cleanth Brooks. Literary Criticism: A Short History. New York: Vintage Books, 1957, p. 222.

26Ibid., p. 223.

27Ibid., p. 222.

28Ibid., p. 222.

2 QJames L. Golden and Edward P.J. Corbett. The Rhetoric of Blair, Campbell and Whately. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968, p. 1.

30Ibid., p. 13.

3-*~Ibid., p. 5.

32 J For a thorough discussion of Elocutionary Theory see Mary Margaret Robb. Oral Interpretation of Literature in American Colleges and Universities. New York: Johnson Reprint Compnay, 1968.

33Corbett, p. 566.

34Edward T. Channing quoted in Marie Hochmuth and Richard Murphy's "Rhetorical and Elocutionary Training in Nineteenth Century Colleges," in A History of Speech Education in America. Edited by Karl R. Wallace. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, Incorporated, 1954, p. 153.

35 Hochmuth and Murphy in Wallace, p. 163. 21

^Hochmuth and Murphy in Wallace, p. 162.

^^Ibid., p. 164.

^^Ibid., p. 164.

39nonald K. Smith. "Origin and. Development of Departments of Speech" in A History of Speech Education in America. Edited by Karl R. Wallace. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, Incorporated, 1954, p. 450.

^Ibid. , p. 449.

4^"Giles Wilkenson Gray. "Some Teachers and the Transition to Twentieth-Century Speech Education," in A History of Speech Education. Edited by Wallace, p. 442.

42Ibid., p. 423.

4^Corbett, pp. 566-567.

44Robert L.. Scott and Bernard L. Brock. Methods of Rhetorical Criticism: A Twentieth Century Perspective. New York: Harper and Row, 1972, p. 123.

4^Ibid., p. 404.

¿^Thomas S. Kuhn. The Structure of Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970.

47 Edwin Black. Rhetorical Criticism: A Study in Method. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1965, p. viii.

4^Scott and Brock, pp. 124-125.

^Lawrence W. Rosenfield. "An Autopsy of the Rhetorical Tradition," in The Prospect of Rhetoric. Edited by Llyod Bitzer and Edwin Black. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, Incorporated 1971, p. 64.

^^Richard McKeon,. "The Uses of Rhetoric in a Technological Age," in The Prospect of Rhetoric. Edited by Bitzer and Black, p. 45.

^Aristotle. The Rhetoric of Aristotle. Translated by Lane Cooper. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1932, p. 1. 22

52 McKeon in The Prospect of Rhetoric, p. 47.

53 see Llyod Bitzer and Edwin Black. The Prospect of Rhetoric. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, Inc. 1971 for a discussion of new directions in contemporary rhetorical thought.

^Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria. Volume III, Book 8, p. 189.

55ibid., pp. 179-181.

^Aristotle. "De Interpretatione" in The Basic Works of Aristotle. Edited by Richard McKeon. New York: Random House, 1941, p. 40.

57j. Samuel Bois. The Art of Awareness. Duboque: William C. Brown Company, 1973, p. 17.

co D. J. Allan. The Philosophy of Aristotle. New York: Oxford University Press, 1952, p. 172.

59 Aristotle. "De Anima" in The Basic Works of Aristotle. Edited by McKeon, p. 595.

^Remy C. Kwant. Phenomenology of Social Existence. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1965, p. 70.

61Allan, p. 72.

62 Richard McKeon. "Aristotle’s Conception of Language and the Arts of Language," Classical Philology. Volume XLI, October 1946, Number 4, p. 202

63 John R. Stewart. Rhetoricians on Language and Meaning: An Ordinary Language Critique. Unpublished P.hD. Dissertation. University of Southern California, 1970. p. 231.

64 Ibid., p. 1-2. 23

CHAPTER II:

DIRECTION: IN CONTEMPORARY RHETORIC 24

In the previous chapter's survey of the classical rhetorical tradi­

tion it was suggested that the status of Rhetoric in education declined as Rhetoric became identified with concern for style and delivery as distinct from the substance of discourse. It was noted that this dichotomy is inherent, though not encouraged, in classical rhetorical theory. Though prior to the twentieth century deviation from classical theory has generally led to a decline in the status of rhetorical stu­ dies in education, the twentieth century deviation has not lead to such an effect. On the contrary; a diffuse body of writings referred to as

Contemporary Rhetoric has attempted to improve the status of and gen­ erate renewed interest in rhetoric, and to revitalize rhetorical scholar­ ship in general. I. A. Richards, Richard M. Weaver, and Kenneth Burke are generally recognized as the three major figures among twentieth century theorists. In this chapter, the contributions of these theorists will be considered with special reference to their perspectives on language.

Further, some selected scholarship of recent origin will be reviewed.

I. A. RICHARDS

The significance of this man in twentieth century criticism is reflected in Stanley Edgar Hyman's remarks that "no treatment of modern criticism is possible without Richards."^ Though a prolific scholar, Richards is probably best known due to the work he co-authored with C. K. Ogden, The Meaning of Meaning. In this classic work, Ogden and Richards indicate that the relation between a symbol and referent 2 is arbitrary. Thus, "frotoplex" could be a symbol for the object automobile as easily and appropriately as the word "automobile." They 25

3 argue that language has referential and emotive functions. This is essentially an extension of the classical logical/emotional dichotomy.

Most importantly, they argue that causal relations hold between symbol and thought, and thought and referent.^ The significance of imputing causal relations is that it explicitly links language (as a type of symbolism) to thought. Though Ogden and Richards link language and thought, they do not develop a particularly deep or detailed analysis of the nature of the causal relations involved. As a theory of meaning, their approach is limited by their assumption that thought is directed to the referent. Though object terms such as table, chair, etc. seem adequately explained by their theory, non-object terms such as fear, hate, love, etc. which lack objective referents are not aptly explained.

Richards views on rhetoric are developed in THE PHILOSOPHY OF

RHETORIC. After deploring the current (1936) state of rhetorical instruc­ tion he argues that rhetoric "should be a study of misunderstanding and its remedies."5 From this perspective rhetoric becomes the study of accurate. communication. For this effort Richards recommends "a per­ sistent, systematic, detailed inquiry into how words work."8 He

Richards identifies the challenging questions of this perspective as

"What is the connection between the mind and the world by which events in the mind mean other events in the world? Or 'How does a thought come to be ’of’ whatever it is that it is a thought of?' or 'What is the relation between a thing and its name?’"8 To these questions

Richards does not provide a definitive answer.I Interestingly, Richards makes no reference to The Meaning of Meaning in this work, though he 26

continues to view language, thought and communication as related.

Richards interest in the study of misunderstanding predates The

Philosophy of Rhetoric. In Practical Criticism he writes that "the

possibilities of human misunderstanding make up indeed a formidable sub- g ject for study." In Practical Criticism Richards develops an analysis

of types of meaning that "most human utterances and nearly all articulate

speech can be profitably regarded from."^ He calls the types: "Sense,

Feeling, Tone, and Intention."^ They are respectively the state of

affairs, the speaker’s feeling toward that state, the speaker’s attitude

toward the listener, and the purpose of effect the speaker is seeking to

achieve. Richards in his discussion of these types of meaning indicates

that one type of meaning may dominate in particular communications. It is

obvious that in any ongoing interaction that a misuderstanding in regard to

any of the meaning types could have undesirable effects. In particular

not understanding a speaker’s feeling toward an event, his attitude

toward the person he is communicating with, and his purpose could lead to

an "inappropriate" response even though the listener understood the

meaning of the statement in its referential aspects.

In summary, Richards views language and thought as causally related.

He sees language as having referential and emotive functions. He views

rhetoric as the study of lmisuderstanding. He provides a category system

for the analysis of meaning. These categories are focal points where misunderstanding may occur.

RICHARD M. WEAVER

The writings of Richard M. Weaver are considered to have "helped 27

reestablish rhetoric as a substantive discipline" and "pointed the way 1 3 toward the current rapprochment between philosophy and rhetoric."

Weaver views rhetoric as having a vital role in the maintainance of

social order. He argues:

States and societies cannot be secure unless there is in their public expression a partnership of dia­ lectic and rhetoric. Dialectic is abstract reason­ ing upon the basis of propositions; rhetoric is the relation of the terms of these to the existential world in which facts are regarded with sympathy and v. are treated with that kind of historical understand­ ing and appreciation which lie outside the dialecti­ cal process.-'-4

Moreover, Weaver concludes

that a society cannot live without rhetoric, T-here are some things in which the group needs to believe which cannot be demonstrated to everyone rationally. Their acceptance is pressed upon us by a kind of moral imperative arising from the group as a whole. To put them to the test of dialectic alone is to destroy the basis of belief in them and to weaken the cohesiveness of society.15

By implication Weaver views rhetoric as contributing to the cohesiveness

of society.

While Weaver aTs a-Platonist, well-versed in the classics, . , 1 < viewed himself as an "embattled friend of traditional rhetoric,"

his defense is of the importance and place of rhetoric rather than

a defense of classical rhetorical concepts. In particular, his per­

spective on language contrasts with the classical perspective of

Aristotle in which meaning is based on the sense perception of things.

Weaver writes:

I am inclined to agree with W. M. Urban, in his Language and Reality, that the situation is the reverse of what is usually conceived. It is not 28

that things give meanings to words; it is that meaning makes things ’’things." It does not make things in their subsistence; but it does make things in their discreteness for the understanding. Extramental reality may itself be a nameless flow of causality, but when we apperceive it, we separate it into "discretes" such as "house," "tree,” "mountain." And naming follows hard upon this, if indeed, it is not an essential part of the process itself. Communication and cognition thus seem very closely related. To know a thing is not to arrive finally at some direct perception of a property, as Locke suggests, but to form some ideal construct of it, in which meaning and value are closely bound. The­ ories of meaning that include only the symbol and the thing symbolized leave out of account the interpreter. But there can be no such thing as meaning in the sense of understanding, unless there is a third entity, the human being, who dyings the two together in a system of comprehension.

Weaver’s view of language is radically different from the classical theorists. He approaches the position of linguistic relativity in writing:

The community of language gives one access to signi­ ficances at which he cannot otherwise arrive. To find a word is to find a meaning partially distributed in other words. Whoever may doubt that language has this power to evoke should try the experimentof thinking without words.18

Thus, Weaver views language as separating reality into discretes, as providing access to significances, and being related to thought.

Value is a key term in Weaver’s rhetorical theory. And he views language as a "subjectively born, intimate, and value laden vehicle."19

His essay "ultimate Terms in Contemporary Rhetoric" provides a pene­ trating analysis of the value-laden power of language.20 Weaver argues that:

We must never lose sight of the order of values as the ultimate sanction of rhetoric. No one z,- 29

can live a life of direction and purpose without some scheme of values. As rhetoric confronts us with choices of involving values, the rhetorician is a preacher to us, noble if he tries to direct our passion towards noble ends and base if he uses our passion to confuse and degrade us. Since all utterance influences us Lin one or the other of these directions, it is important that the direction be the right one, and it is better if this lay preacher is a master of his art.

Weaver’s view of the importance of value exhibited in language

lead to his criticism of purely materialist or "physicalist" views

"that meaning must somehow tag along after empirical reality." Weaver argues that this view "collapses the relationship between what is physical and what is symbolic of meaning and value . . . (and) is another evidence of how the modern mind is trying to surrender its constitutive powers to the objective physical world."22 This criti­ cism is applicable in particular to theories of meaning which view meaning as referent.

In summary, Weaver views rhetoric as a vital force in social cohesiveness, language as constructing the discrete units of extra­ mental reality, language as related to communication, thought, and value, and the mind as having constitutive powers.

KENNETH BURKE

According to W. H. Auden, Kenneth Burke is one of the most influen­ tial of the twentieth century theorists and critics.23 Burke's view of language and symbolism permeate all of his prolific critical and theoretical works. They are most concentrated in Language as Symbolic

Action. In this work Burke indicates that:

Man -is...... the symbol-using (symbol-making, symbol-misusing) animal 30

inventor of the negative (or moralized by the negative) separated from his natural condition by instruments of his own making ...... goaded by. the spirit of hierarchy (or moved by a sense of order) and rotten with perfection.24

In this definition of man a number of points are worthy of explana­

tion. Man, is seen as distinctive because of his symbol-using-mak­

ing abilities. Through-symbolism man can conceive of "reality" in

its absence and thus, his actions are not solely dependent on the

impinging present. Man is separated from his natural condition as

animal through his creations of language, tools, and culture. Man is

motivated by "the incentives of organization and status" which are

socio-linguistically defined. Finally, "there is a principle of per­

fection implicit in the nature of symbol systems; and in keeping with

his nature as symbol-using animal, man is moved by this principle." ~>

Burke views this principle of perfection as "central to the nature

of language as motive."26

It is in his view of language as motive that Burke makes his most

distinctive contribution. It is crucial to understanding this per­

spective that one realize that Burke does not view language as evoking or activating motives or drives. Rather, he views language as being the motive or as constituting motive. He explains that

Once words are added . . . the purely biological nature of pleasure, pain, love, hate, fear is quite transcended, since all are perceived through the coloration that the inveterate human involvement with words imparts to them. And the same is true of all sheer bodily sensations, which are likewise affected by the new order of motivation made possible (and inevitable?) once this extra odd dimension is added to man’s natural animality. From this point on, no matter what man's motives might be in their nature 31

as sheerly animal, they take on a wholly new aspect, as defined by the resources and embarassments of symbolism.27

In viewing language as motive, Burke links language to action. And

this link is vitally important for the rhetorician who attempts to

explain human behavior that occurs as a consequence of linguistic

communication.

Burke recognizes that the resources of language are "’traditional*

that is: social. And such sociality of meaning is grounded in a

sociality of material conduct, or cooperation." ° Language is linked

to meaning which is grounded'in social action. Burke assumes "that rhetoric was developed by the use of language for the purposes of cooperation and competition. It served to form appropriate attitudes that were designed to induce corresponding acts."29 Extending the notion that rhetoric serves "to form appropriate attitudes. . . to induce corresponding acts" Burke like Weaver seems to see a social binding function for rhetoric and an influence of symbolism on per­ ception. He indicates that socio-political orders are "held together by a vast network of verbally perfected meanings, (and that it might follow that) man must perceive nature through the fog of symbol-ridden social structures that he has erected atop nature."30

Burke’s key methodological contribution to rhetorical analysis is his dramatistic pentad consisting of five terms: Scene, Act, Agent,

Agency, and Purpose. These terms constitute categories for the analysis of linguistic symbolism. r Burke believes that these cate­ gories constitute "the basic forms of thought which, in accordance with the nature of the world as all men necessarily experience it, 32

are exemplified in the attributing of motives.”32

In summary Burke views rhetoric as "the mode of appeal essential

for bridging the conditions of estrangement "natural" to society as we

know it."33 it is rhetoric which enables men to share motives and

act cooperatively. Burke views language as constitutive of motive.

Like Weaver he sees rhetoric as binding society together. He specu­

lates that symbols may influence the perception of reality. And he

provides categories for the analysis of discourse in relation to

assessing motive.

CURRENT SCHOLARSHIP

In 1970 the Speech Communication Association, supported by a

grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, sponsored a

National Developmental Project on Rhetoric. One of the outcomes of

the conference was The Prospect of Rhetoric edited by Lloyd F. Bitzer

and Edwin Black. The text, which is a collection of essays and

committee reports generated by the project, can be expected to exert

considerable influence on efforts in contemporary rhetorical theory

and criticism in the immediate future. While there is much of value

in the text, I wish to call attention to the three committee reports which conclude the text. The presumably consensus views of these

committees are in sharp contrast to the focus of traditional rhetoric o ! on the speech as the unit of rhetorical discourse. 4 In contrast to

the traditional perspective, consider the following three excerpts from

the committee reports:

1. The Committee on the Scope of Rhetoric and the Place of

Rhetorical Studies in Higher Education states: "Rhetoric is not 33

exclusively a study of public speaking, its concern encompasses

symbols of inducement whether they are expressed as speeches, essays,

in films, drama, novels, poems or demonstrations."33

2. The Committee on the Advancement and Refinement of Rhetorical

Criticism exhorts that: "Rhetorical criticism must broaden its scope

to examine the full range of rhetorical transactions; that is, informal

conversations, group settings, public setting, mass media messages,

picketing, sloganeering, symbols, cross cultural transactions, and

so forth.”38

3. The Committee on the Nature of Rhetorical Invention predicts:

If a revitalized conception of rhetorical .invention- takes on form and substance, its pedagogical impact and its promise for instructional improvement should prove considerable. It should open perspectives on the rhetorical dynamic operating not simply in public address, but in history, literature, philosophy, and other disciplines. It should sensitize the critic to the rhe- torical presence within these dimensions, and sharpen his per­ ceptions and evaluations of such presence.

These recommendations are consistent with the recommendations and

practice of Richards and Burke. (Weaver seems unconcerned with this

issue.) From the perspective of the classical tradition, these

current recommendations must be viewed as a diffusion of focus. The

consequence of such diffusion of research over a wide range of dis­ course might be general superficiality of theory and criticism. It was perhaps in anticipation of this "obvious" criticism that the committee’s indicated respectively that "Rhetorical studies are properly concerned with the process by which symbols and systems of

symbols have influence upon beliefs, values, attitudes and actions;"38

"The critic becomes rhetorical to the extent that he studies his 34

39 subject in terms of its suasory potential or persuasive effect;"

and that "rhetoric's traditional involvement with persuasion and 40 probabilities links it inevitably with invention." In this'respect

The Prospect of Rhetoric endorses the traditional neo-aristotelian

identification of rhetoric with persuasion. And in this respect The

Prospect of Rhetoric deviates widely from Richards for whom "persuasion

is only one among the aims of discourse.Though Burke notes that

"there is an intrinsically rhetorical motive, situated in the persuasive use of language," he also notes that Rhetoric "is rooted in an essential

function of language itself, a function that is wholly realistic, and is continually born anew; the use of language as a symbolic means of •A3 inducing cooperation in beings that by nature respond to symbols.

Though Burke's "inducing cooperation" is not antithetical to persuasion, it seem to be a broader conception. That is while persuasion necessarily induces cooperation, cooperation may be induced without persuasion.

For instnace, if someone asks you a question which you answer, it does not seem appropriate to say that you were persuaded to answer, though it seems appropriate to say that the question induced your cooperation.

Such transactions warrant critical attention from rhetorical scholarship.

TRENDS IN CONTEMPORARY RHETORIC

It is a frequently voiced complaint that contemporary rhetorical theory does not form a coherent tradition. That it is fragmented and incongrous in perspective. The survey of Richards, Weaver, and Burke on language indicates that at least on this dimension that criticism is invalid. While these three major contemporary theorists do not 35

hold identical views of language, their views seem complementary and

in no respects contradictory. By consensus, one would suggest that contemporary rhetorical theory holds the following propositions to be true:

1. The relationship between a symbol and referent is arbitrary.

2. Language is value-laden.

3. Language and thought are integrally related.

4. Language constitutes motive.

5. Language and social order are related.

6. Language effects the perception of reality.

Aristotle and classic rhetorical theorists recognized only the first two propositions.

In terms of subject matter contemporary rhetorical theory does not limit the theorist to spoken discourse. Any type of linguistic discourse invites the attention of the contemporary theorists. There is controversy among contemporary theorists on whether rhetorical scholarship must focus on persuasion. While historically rhetoric has long been identified with persuasion, I would suggest that rhetori­ cians should study the full range of the communicative uses of language.

Persuasion is a consequence of linguistic communication. Rhetoricians, should seek to understand the multiple and interactive functions of language in discourse of which persuasion is only one of the consequences. 36

CHAPTER II - ENDNOTES

■^Stanley Edgar Hyman. The Armed Vision. New York: Vintage Books, 1955. p. 278.

2 C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards. The Meaning of Meaning. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Incorporated 1923. p. 11.

^Ibid., p. 10.

^Ibid., p. 11.

^1. A. Richards. The Philosophy of Rhetoric. New York: Oxford University Press, 1936. p. 3.

^Ibid., p. 23.

7Ibid., p. 23.

8Ibid., p. 28.

^1. A. Richards. Practical Criticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Incorporated 1929, p. 177.

■*-®Ibid. , p. 175.

l*Ibid., p. 175.

12ibid., pp. 175-176.

13 Richard L. Johanneson, Rennard Strickland and Ralph T. Eubanks. "Richard M. Weaver on the Nature of Rhetoric: An Interpretation" in Language is Sermonic. Edited by Richard L. Johanneson, Rennard Strickland and Ralph T. Eubanks. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964. p. 56.

14 Richard M. Weaver. Visions of Order. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964. p. 56.

l^ibid., p. 65.

^Richard M. Weaver. In a "Letter to Ralph T. Eubanks" quoted in Language is Sermonic. p. 3, p. 4.

^Richard M. Weaver. "Relativism and the Use of Language," in Language is Sermonic. pp. 121-122. 37

1 8 °Richard M. Weaver. Ideas Have Consequences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948. p. 159.

■'■^Richard M. Weaver. ’’Language is Sermonic" in Language is Sermonmc. p. 223.

20 see Richard M. Weaver. The Ethics of Rhetoric. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1953. pp. 211-232.

^Hjeaver, "Language is Sermonic" in Language is Sermonic. p. 225.

2 2Weaver. "Relativism and the Use of Language" in Language is Sermonic. p. 133.

23 W. H. Auden. The New Republic. July 14, 1941. p. 59.

o / Z4Kenneth Burke. Language as Symbolic Action. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1966. p. 16.

23Ibid., p. 17.

26Ibid., p. 16.

27 Kenneth Burke. Attitudes Toward History. Los Altos: Hermes Publishing Company, 1959. p. 373.

28 Kenneth Burke. Permanence and Change. Los Altos: Hermes Publishing Company, 1954. p. liii.

29ßurke, Language as Symbolic Action, p. 296.

30Ibid., p. 378.

31 see Kenneth Burke. A Grammar of Motives. New York: Prentice Hall, Incorporated. 1945.

82 Ibid., p. xvii.

oo Kenneth Burke. A Rhetoric of Motives. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969. pp, 211-212.

. 34see. Lester Thonssen,", A. Craig Baird, and Waldo W. Braden. x Speech Criticism. New York: The Ronald Press, 1970. p. 298. 38

33in The Prospect of Rhetoric. Edited by Lloyd F. Bitzer and Edwin Black. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, Incorporated 1971, p. 210.

36Ibid., P. 225.

37Ibid., P. 234-35.

38Ibid., P- 208.

3^Ibid., P- 220.

40Ibid., P. 229.

^Richards. The Philosophy of Rhetoric, p. 24.

42Burke. A Rhetoric of Motives, p. 43.

43Ibid., P- 43. . 39

CHAPTER III:

LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT 40

Among the propositions of contemporary rhetorical theory developed

in the last chapter was: language and thought are integrally related.

This proposition is of fundamental importance because it leads to the

realization that the human mind utilizes language in at least some

types of cognitive processes. And language being a product of social

interaction may constrain thought. Moreover, behavior may be directed

by cognitiveprocesses. Thus, this proposition leads to the recognition

of the relationship between language, thought and action. In this

chapter I will be concerned with the nature of the relationship

between language and thought. In such an endeavor one is lead

inevitably to the writings of Benjamin Lee Whoff. Whorf’s views on

language and thought are not developed into a systematic theory.

Rather his views are inconsistent and must be gleaned from his various essays. The primary source for Whorf’s views is Language,

Thought and Reality (a collection of Whorf’s writings edited by John

B. Carroll). Whorf’s writings and theories are provocative. As one rhetorician put it they are "disputed but compelling."'''

WHORFIAN HYPOTHESES

Whorf recognized that "The problem of thought and thinking in the native community is not purely and simply a psychological problem.

It is quite largely cultural. It is moreover largely a matter of one especially cohesive aggregate of cultural phenomena that we call a 2 language." For Whorf one thinks in a language and that language shapes what one thinks and perceives. He explains:

We dissect nature along lines laid down by our native languages. The categories and types that we isolate 41

from the world of phenomena we do not find there because they stare every observer in the face; on the contrary, the world is presented in a kaleidoscopic flux of impressions which has to ,be organized by our minds. We cut nature up, organize it info concepts, and ascribe significance as we do, largely because we are parties to an agreement to organize it in this way--an agreement that holds throughout our speech community and is codified in the patterns of our language. The agreement is, of course, an implicit and unstated one, BUT ITS TERMS ARE ABSOLUTELY OBLIGATORY; we cannot talk at all except by subscribing to the organization and classification of data which the agreement decrees*.^ ‘

Whorf’s views seem coherent with those of general semantics. Language

abstracts only certain characteristics of an event. There is no

reason to assume different languages abstract the same characteristics.

In suggesting that the effects of language are "absolutely obligatory,"

Whorf notes the necessity of following language conventions in order

to communicate. "Friggit szompt deatat" is not a meaningful English

statement. It cannot be decoded by an English speaker with any confi­

dence. Though one be told that the expression means "Frost yields

destruction" and thus understand future uses of the expression, ease

and clarity of communication demand a normative use of the language.

It is obvious that communication demands a normative use of the language.

It is obvious that communication plays a vital role in human interaction.

While coined words may have an alluring novelty, their ability to

communicate meaning even in future transactions depends on one’s ability

to clarify;their meaning in the common code. That one can arbitrarily

specify that I mean "Frost yields destruction" by "Friggit szompt

deatat" only indicates that JIc can create transformational equivalents

of my native language. It is true by definition that without an 42

English linguistic, equivalent’of- "Friggit szompt deatat" the meaning

of that phrase could not be linguistically communicated to an English

speaker. Thus, the necessities of effective communication and possible

social sanctions* tend to require’ the mode of thought be in the linguistic

pattern of the language communities. I would testify that I conceive

of no alternative way to "think of” or communicate concerning the sub­

stance of this discourse which is other than a transformational linguistic

equivalent. My thought and social communication seem constrained by

language.

Whorf holds such a view. In one of his strongest statements con­ cerning the relationship of language and thought he indicates:

thinking is most mysterious, and by far the greatest light upon it that we have is thrown by the study of language. This study shows that the forms of a person’s thoughts;are controlled by inexorable laws of pattern of which he is unconscious. These patterns are the unperceived intricate systematizations of his own language--shown readily enough by a candid compari­ son and contrast with other languages, especially those of a different linguistic family. His thinking itself is in a language—in English, in Sanskrit, in Chinese. And every language is a vast pattern-system, different from others, in which are culturally r'ordained the forms and categories by which the personality not only communicates, but also analyzes nature, notices or!neglects types of'relationship and phenomena, channels his reasoning, and builds the house of his consciousness.

In this excerpt, Whorf suggests a pervasive relationship between language and thought in which language is the determinant of thought.

As was noted earlier Whorf’.s views are not entirely consistent.

''Social sanctions to maintain consistency in the linguistic code vary from correcting pronunciation and vocabulary to moving schizo­ phrenics and other psychotics who cease to "properly" use the language to sanitariums. 43

At times Whorf suggests that language is a factor which influences

thought, on other occasions language is taken as the determinant of

thought and perception. Because of these iintconsistencies a number

of versions of the Whorfian hypothesis exist. Sometimes referred to

as the weak and strong forms of the hypothesis. I believe the distinc­

tion between these forms is more easily grasped through considering

the weak version as the hypothesis of linguistic relativity and the

strong version as the hypothesis of linguistic determinism. The

hypothesis of linguistic relativity suggests that "formulation of ideas

is not an independent process . . . but is part of a particular grammar,

andfdiffers from slightly to greatly, between different grammars."3 The

hypothesis of linguistic determinism goes beyond this to suggest that

language acts to control thought and perception. Linguistic deter­ minism gives linguistic relativity added significance. The hypothesis

of linguistic relativity does not entail perceptual differences between

speakers of differing languages. It would allow a view of perception as physiologically determined. Linguistic determinism denies physiological

determinism and argues that linguistically influenced cognitive processes

control the utilization of physiologically based perceptual capacities.

The scientific status of these Whorfian hypotheses is a matter of continuing dispute. However, there is considerable support for the relativity hypothesis. Roger Brown describes this hypothesis as "very well established." He explains

In this case "language" is a formal system, a phono­ logy, a morphology, and a grammar. "Thought" is a set of cognitive catetories manifest in the discrimi­ nating use of names. The thesis that language (as phonology, etc.,) and thought (as selective linguistic 44

response) covary is established if it is shown that formally distinct languages are also seman­ tically distinct. Whorf and others have presented ample evidence that this is true on the level of the lexicon, of the form class and of certain grammatical categories . . . linguistic relativity serves to overthrow the notion that all languages code the same categories.6

A recent assessment by James J. Jenkins suggests that

there seems to be a variety of sources of evidence for the "weak" version of the Whorfian hypothesis, leading to the general conclusion that language influences psychological processes such as recog­ nition, recall, problem solving and concept forma­ tion, but no real support for the major version of the hypothesis . . . One is likely to conclude, after studying the evidence that language influences thought processes is a variety of ways, . . . but is unlikely to conclude that language determines thought processes in anything like the fashion that Whorf at one time suspected.7

It is important to recall that "the major version of the hypothesis” is linguistic determinism. It suggests language determines thought and perception. If language merely influences cognitive processes, then insufficient support for the hypothesis exists. Yet it would be wise to note that while there is as yet no strong support for linguistic determinism,,it is a hypothesis which also "has never been disproven."^ One fundamental difficulty of testing linguistic determinism is that the hypothesis leaves perception an undefined term. . While this might not seem to cause serious difficulty, one’s perspective on perception is of considerable significance in hypo­ thesis testing. Robert Terwilliger explains the nature of this difficulty in writing:

Most psychologists maintain a dualistic view of perception, in which there are pure experiences 45

of sensations, which are a function of physical stimuli alone, and then there are interpretations, judgments,- inferences, associations, or whatever that are'made using this pure sensory material. To these theorists, language might conceivably effect the latter cognitive processes, but it could not conceivably effect the pure sensation. Another group of theorists, notably the Gestalt school, has rejected this so-called constancy hypothesis and assumes that incoming sensory events are never sufficient to account for consciousness or percep­ tion. Other internal organizers are required. Once one accepts this position, as I do, it becomes diffi­ cult if not impossible to differentiate betwe'en per­ ceptual and bther conscious processes. To say that language influences perception is simply to say that language influences conscious processes in a situa­ tion where it is impossible to tell what is purely perceptual consciousness and what is not.^

Ones approach to perception necessarily effects design considerations in testing the Whorfian hypotheses. And, of course, given- two per­ spectives on perception one is lead to two interpretations of linguistic determinism. One interpretation suggests that language determines perception as "pure experiences of sensations." The other interpreta­ tion suggests that language determines how we construct incoming physical stimuli. Terwilliger provides a hypothetical example based on research findings which illustrates the difference between these two interpretations. He states:

Now let’s suppose we take the subject out of the laboratory and put him in the real world. Is he not likely to tell us that two things look the same, or look similar, because they are both colored shades of x? And yet in a psychological experiment he would also tell us that the two hues were distinctly differ­ ent, which, in fact they are perceptually. Let us take an extreme example. Suppose some hypothetical Iakuti was telling us about his culture and that he mentioned that typically people painted all the rooms in their houses the same color. In this case, he had painted his entire interior x. Now we happen to 46

be in his house at the time and are quite surprised to see that his living room is blue and his bedroom is green. Here is the crux of the issue; both the Iakuti and I would agree that the hues of the living room-and the- bedroom were .different «afifiBut " at the same time to him they are similar colors, while to me they are not. To him they resemble one another while to me they do not.: Here is a clear linguistic influence on something. The only thing which the psychologists would argue about is what is being influ­ enced. Is this a perceptual phenomenon or is it not? Certainly we might agree that it is some sort of cog­ nitive phenomenon, and thus we have at least some hypo­ thetical. .evidence', for an effect of language on cogni­ tion. 1-0

The interpretation of linguistic determinism based on "pure experiences of sensation"--which is tested by subjects ability to detect stimuli and discriminate between stimuli--is untenable. Speakers of language without codes distinguishing blue and green can discriminate between blue and green. The interpretation of linguistic determinism based on construction of incoming stimuli is supportable. This interpreta­ tion suggests that the native speakers in their native environment will tend to make those discriminations dictated by their language. In other words, language habits will tend to control the manner in which men utilize their perceptual capacities even though those capacities are not linguistic and may be directed differently by alternative language constructions. In one respect this interpretation of Whorf is not adequately described by "linguistic determinism." Determinism implies total control. This interpretation suggests that language directs perceptual capacities but not that such direction is total control. I would suggest that this interpretation would be more clearly labeled as linguistic dominance and will refer to it by that label in the future. 47

EMPIRICAL SUPPORT FOR LINGUISTIC DOMINANCE

Empirical investigations concerning the relation between languages

and cognitive processes including perception center on the notion of

codability. In these investigations languages is viewed as a code.

In relation to the description of any particular object or event

the language may have either a high or low codability. For instance,

if a single word codes an object, then that object has high codability.

On the other hand, if the object requires several words to code, then

it is low in codability. Presumably, the lower the codability: the

greater the amount of cognitive processing: the lesser the availability

of the code for utilization. As Terwilliger indicates: "The availability

of words in a given language determines the sorts of sensory and behavioral

classifications which a speaker of a language can make.Brown suggests

"that a perceptual category that is frequently utilized is more available

than one less frequently utilized."^2 Brown’s perceptual category must

exist at a symbolic level and language is a dominant social symbolism.

John B. Carroll in his Language and Thought reviews the literature of empirical research on codability. Among the research supporting the hypothesis of linguistic dominance were studies by Brown and Lenneberg,

Lenneberg and Roberts, and Carmichael, Hogan and Walter. The Brown and Lenneberg study concluded that "the ability of speakers of English to recognize and remember colors was related to the ’codability’ of those colors in English.”^ in a following comparative study of

Zuni and English speakers, Lenneberg and Roberts found that "Zuni speakers had more trouble in recognizing and remembering colors that were poorly 48

coded in Zuni but well coded in English, and conversely for color

ranges letter coded in Zuni than in English."3-4 Perhaps the classic

experiment suggesting linguistic dominance is a study by Carmichael,

Hogan and Walters. In this study subjects were briefly exposed to a

set of visual figures which were paired with verbal labels. Subjects

were later asked to reproduce these figures from memory. The results

of the study indicated that

"The reproductions were influenced by the labels assigned at the time of original exposure. For example, the^*^D tended to be reproduced as some­ thing like^^^if it had been labeled "eyeglasses" whereas it might be reproduce d^A© if had been labeled "dumbbells." Further experimental analysis of this phenomenon support the conclusion that the label presented by the experimenter tends to "channel" the stimulus function of the figure in the direction of the concept represented by the label; unless the sub­ ject has prolonged opportunity to study the figure, or the delay period is relatively short, it is principally this "concept" that is remembered, rather than some direct representation. Indeed, even subjects who are not shown any verbal label will invent their own labels and their later reproductions of the figures will often reveal the nature of these labels. It should be noted, incidentally, that the use of a label, whether by the subject alone or else by the experimenter implies that the label refers to a concept; thus, the figure is perceived as being one of a class of similar experiences named by the concept.^

This experiment strongly supports the notion of linguistic dominance.

It suggests that language acts as a cognitive organizer to channel

and direct the organization of sensory inputs. Especially interesting

is the finding that subjects invent labels for the figures even when

they are not provided by the experimenter. Such a finding indicates

that it is possible for alternative language constructions to direct perceptual organization. 49

In addition the experiment has considerable hueristic value. The

primacy of vision over other senses is common knowledge. A figure

such as O'"—© produces a visual image in much the same manner as the

word "dumbells." The difference between the two images is that the

word has meaning beyond what is presentationally apparent while the

figure does not. In a sense all mental activity is symbolic. The

image of the figure held in the mind is symbolic of the thing itself.

The Carmichael, Hogan, and Walters experiment may be interpreted to

suggest that a hierarchy exists in the mind’s ability to process types of symbolism. Visual symbols may therefore be lower in codability

than verbal symbols and consequently less available for cognitive processes such as memory.

John P. Van de Gear summarizes his own research concerning coda­ bility in perception by suggesting what conclusion can be drawn and the key question awaiting resolution. He writes

codability is a factor in the cognitive process of identification and recognition. But we do not know what is first; do stimuli have particular character­ istics that make it easy for a linguistic label to become associated with them, or is the linguistic label located at an arbitrary range of the stimulus space that, when present, makes the stimulus salient?

Current research has not resolved this question. Perhaps future research will.

RELATED PERCEPTION RESEARCH

In addition to research directed specifically to versions of the Whorfian hypothesis or codability, there is a vast quantity of research investigation relating perception to perceptual set, expectation, 50

assumptions, and motivation. The difficulty with interpreting this

research in regard to the hypothesis of linguistic dominance is that

it is not clear whether these'- factorsare- linguistically based. How­

ever, insofar as language either influences of constitutes these other

factors then considerably more support exists for linguistic dominance.

It is clear that even if these other factors are not themselves linguis-

feiéâllyr dominated, they are necessarily symbolic and would still support

a position which suggests linguistic symbolism operates in similar fashion.

Tamotsu Shibutani reports a study considering the effect of expecta­

tions on perception between Mexican and American subjects. In this experiment, Bagby •

set up ten slides to be viewed through a stereoscope. On one side he mounted pictures of objects familiar to most Mexicans--such as a matador, a darkihaired girl, a peon. On the other he mounted a similar picture of objects familiar to most Americans--such as a baseball player, a blonde girl, a farmer. The corresponding photographs resembled one another in contour, texture, and the distribution of light and shadows. Although! there were a few exceptions, in general the Americans saw only what was already familiar to them, and the Mexicans likewise saw only the scenes placed in their own culture. Thus, selection and interpretation of sensory cues rests to a surprising extent upon expecta­ tions formed while participating in groups. Any change of perspectives--from becoming acquainted with a new culture or from some unusual experience', such as learning that one will die in a few months--leads one to notice things he had previously overlooked and to see the same familiar world in a different light.

The Bagby study and Shibutani discussion indicate a widely shared view that "Our perception depends in 'large part on the assumptions we j Q ✓ bring to any particular occasion;” and that "a person sees what is sig­ nificant,' with significance defined in terms of his relationship to what 51

he is looking at."3^ The Bagby experiment seems to be a good example of the dominance of a non-linguistic symbolism in perceptual organiza­ tion. In this case the contrast is between visual images which are familiar to the subject and images with which he has had less contact.

The more frequently seen image--in this case due to cultural differences in the subjects experience--was the image he "saw."

Generalizing concerning a school of research on perception Remy

C. Kwant indicates that

Gestalt psychology has definitively shown that genuine seeing—not just staring, which is not genuine seeing-- always takes place within the structure of figure and horizon, and this figure implies an organization of the visible world. The field of our seeing is the world. In this world there are concealed an indefinite number of visible objects, but these objects are only latently visible, potentially visible. To become visible in the genuine sense of the term, they must rise up as figures against the horizon of the world. But they will do this only when man, as meaning-giving existence, assigns a meaning to them. Man makes something arise as a figure from the horizon of the world, he gives meaning to it and thereby organizes the world.20

Kwant does not take a psychophysical view of perception. It is not the mere reception of the stimuli that is importaftt, but its registration on the mind. Burkhart Holzner continues in a similar but extended direction indicating that:

Both the findings of behavioral psychology and the description of the experiential process of object perception by the phenomenologist establish the process nature of perception and point to its basis in motivationally founded expectations. In the course of this process there occurs an interaction between ' sense experience and symbolization. Linking the pre­ sent discussion with our previous remarks about the basis contexts of the moment of actual experience, we can say that as the process of perception andpinter-r pretation progresses, the percept or phenomenon becomes 52

more and more precisely located in the contexts of time-space, symbolization, values, and communicative potential. It is finally subject to definite interp pretation in the terms of a more or less specific frame of referenee.21

Thus, the conclusion that symbolization is involved with perception

seems Clear. To what extent language is quantitatively or qualita­

tively the dominant type of symbolization must be determined by further;

research. Nonetheless, there is reason to believe that language is

related to factors such as expectation and motivation. That is to say

that prior to experience, language may shape one’s expectation. That

is, one may be told /in language/ what to expect. Further, as was noted in Chapter II, Contemporary Rhetorical Theorists such as Kenneth

Burke view language as motive providing a theoretical basis for inter­ preting research on the effects of motivation on perception as supporting the hypothesis of linguistic dominance.

IMPLICATION'S OF LINGUISTIC RELATIVITY AND LINGUISTIC DOMINANCE FOR RHETORIC

The hypotheses of linguistic relativity and linguistic dominance are rich in their implications for rhetoric-communication. At the present time most of the research on these hypotheses are of a cross-cultural variety.

Thus,. whi‘l’e;it is widely recogriize.d that codability is an important factor in cross-cultural communication and obvious that content areas where one language is high in codability and the other low are particularly diffi­ cult to communicate about; not enough research exists of a intra-lingui- stic nature to make the notion of linguistic relativity any more profound than the standard advice of "Speak in terms your audience can understand."

Nonetheless, codability may be a more precise approach to determine what terms should be chosen than general vocabulary level. In regard to 53

rhetorical invention linguistic relativity would suggest that the most

probable spontaneous generation of arguments would produce arguments

which were high in codability. That is relatively short, uncomplicated,

easy to think of positions. While complex arguments which are low

in codability require more discourse to be presented areethe product

of deliberation. In this sense, the language constrains thought because

areas of low codability require greater cognitive processing and ,'are

thus more difficult to think about.

Linguistic dominance is an extremely powerful hypothesis. Like

linguistic relativity this hypothesis needs greater investigations on

an intra-linguistic level. Much more than linguistic relativity, how

linguistic dominance functions within a given language is a vital question

for the rhetorical scholar. Obviously the terms of a language limit a

native speaker since terms of other language are generally unavailable

to him. Yet within any given language there are often alternative terms which may be applied to any event. One’s susceptability to the influence of alternative language constructions is probably higher within a language

than between languages. That is within a given language one’s vocabulary often includes alternative terms which in a particular case are not being utilized. However, that alternative terms are in one’s vocabulary should suggest it is possible for one to view the event in those terms.

Those terms are available for utilization. In the resolution of con­ troversy" this potential for utilization of alternative constructions is crucial. To explain change of linguistic behavior one may appeal

‘interestingly, controversy is a disagreement concerning the characterization.of events in words with different groups applying words with incompatible meanings. 54

to this potential which allows the individual to reorganize his per­ ceptual field and find that the alternative pattern ’’makes sense" and/or to higher order linguistic interactions, and as a function of member­ ship in a speech community. That is to say, (1) that the individual may act an his own initiative and find an alternative construction a more satisfactory organization of his experience or one may "try" a different perspective and then be "unable" to construct things as he saw them before, (2) that through language interactions alone one may impel change, such as the introduction of new vocabulary with new terms interacting with old lending to a change in linguistic behavior beyond just using new terms. The interaction with the new terms may also produce a reorder­ ing of the old, and (3) that the speech community (ies) in which one lives or with which one interacts will have preferred terms for characterizing events and one will be influenced through socialization and redundancy in interactions to utilize those terms. Changes in speech communities may, be expected to produce changes in linguistic behavior.

LANGUAGE AND RHETORICAL THOUGHT

While language and thought are not synonomous terms, linguistic relativity suggests that language and thought covary. Given this, for the purposes of the rhetorical critic, theorists, or any student of ver­ bal communication languages and thought may be regarded as equivalent.

Indeed, for such purposes "it is hardly possible to distinguish between thought and its verbal manifestation."zz As Charlton Laird suggests

"Brains think with words." J Even if thought without language is possible, Laird argues that we have learned to think with words and 55

"rely upon them so much that for practical purposes most people think

only about things for which they have words and can think only in the o / directions for which they have words." * Thus, Max Black's view "of

thought as immanent or indwelling in its adequate symbolic expression"^

is useful. Students of rhetoric communication are concerned with thought

which can be communicated and non-symbolic, non-linguistic thought, if

it exists, is not our concern.

LANGUAGE AND ACTION

The relationship between language and human action is an extension

of the relation between language and thought. It is so obvious that it

requires little discussion. The intuitive evidence for the proposition

that language directs human action is overwhelming. Every verbal instruc­

tion which is followed, every request which is fulfilled, every command

that is obeyed testifies to the capacity of linguistic direction of

behavior. Though the directions suggested by linguistic communications may be rejected, that rejection is best understood as the result of an

interaction among linguistic symbolisms in which a conflict in direction between two sets of symbolism is resolved by the rejection of one set.

For example, a pacifist who is ordered to kill is linguistically directed to act in a contradictory manner to other previously internalized linguis­ tic'' symbolisms. One of these sets of symbolism must be rejected in order to resolve the conflict in direction. Which will be rejected depends on the relationship of each symbolic set with other symbolic sets of the individual. The more embedded a set of symbolism within the total symbo­ lic system of the individual the more resistantcit will be to rejection. 56

That language may direct behavior is widely recognized. In

America, behaviorists treat "internalized language as a mediating or response.' ° That is

It mediates the connection between the stimulus and overt behavior. It mediates the connection between the stimulus and the response in the sense that the stimulus doesunot directly:cause the response. Rather the stimulus gives rise to the central mediator which in turn gives rise to the response. Thus, responses are not made directly to properties of the stimulus but only to the mediators aroused by the stimuli.27

While the manner in which behaviorists believe the stimuli "give rise" to mediators is subject to correction given the implications of linguis­ tic dominance for perception, the theoretical link between language and the direction of behavior in behavioral psychology is the key point in our present discussion. As sociologist Joyce Hertzler puts in "infor­ mation . . . ¿which is always conveyed in some linguistic form . . . goes a long way toward determining . . . behavior. The ’bondage to words’ is a stark social reality."28

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

The hypothesis of linguistic relativity and linguistic dominance are well established and supportable respectively. Both hypotheses hav strong implicationsffor Rhetoric. For purposes of analysis, criticism and prediction these hypothesis are powerful explanatory concepts. They enhance our understanding of the rhetorical process by pointing to its underlying factors: the relationship between language, thought, and action. 57

CHAPTER III - ENDNOTES

^Richard Ohmann. ”.In Lieu of a New Rhetoric," in Contemporary- Theories of Rhetoric: Selected Readings. Edited by Richard L. Johannesen. New York: Harper and Row, 1971. p. 67.

o '‘•Benjamin Lee Whorf. Language, Thought and Reality. Edited by John B. Carroll. New York: John Wiley and Sons, Incorporated 1958. p. 65.

3Ibid., PP- 213-214.

4Ibid., PP- 252.

3Ibid., PP- 212-213.

^Roger Brown. Words and Things. Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press, 1958. pp. 260-261.

^Janies J. Jenkins. "Language and Thought," in Approaches to Thought. Edited by James F. Voss. Columbus: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1969. p. 218.

.^Robert F. Terwilliger. Meaning and Mind: A Study in the Psychology of Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. p. 293.

9Ibid., pp. 268-269.

3^Ibid., p. 268.

33Terwilliger, p. 286.

32Brown, p. 236.

33John B. Carroll. Language and Thought. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall Incorporated 1964. p. 107.

34lbid., p. 108.

33Ibid., pp. 96-97.

36john p. Van de Geer. "Codability in Perception," in The Psychosociology of Language. Edited by Serge Moscovici. Chicago: Markham Publishing Company, 1972. p. 9. 58

^•^Tamotsu Shibutani. "Reference Groups and Social Control," in Human Behavior and Social Processes. Edited by Arnold M. Rose. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 131.

l^Henry Cantril. "Perception and Interpersonal Relations," in Current Perspectives in Social Psychology. Second Edition. Edited by Edwin P. Hollander and Raymond G. Hunt. New York: Oxford University Press, 1967. p. 284.

19Ibid.. p. 286.

2®Remy C. Kwant. Phenomenology of Social Existence. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press 1965. p. 70.

2^Burkhart Holzner. Reality Construction in Society. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Schenkman Publishing Company 1968. p. 27.

22 Max Black. The Labyrinth of Language. New York: A Mentor Book, 1968. p. 88.

2 3 JCharlton Laird. The Miracle of Language. Greenwich, Connecticut: Fawcett Publications, 1953. p. 224.

?Zl Ibid., p. 224.

23Black, p. 88.

¿26"Peter Herriot. An Introduction to the Psychology of Language. London: Metheun and Company, Limited 1970, p. 137.

27T3rwilliger, p. 117.

28Joyce 0. Hertzler. A Sociology of Language. New York: Random House 1965. p. 267. 59

CHAPTER IV:

SOCIAL REALITY CONSTRUCTION 60

INTRODUCTION

In this chapter I shall be concerned with the relationship between

rhetoric and reality which are based upon relationships between language,

thought, and action developed in the previous chapter. I shall consider

the meaning of the term "reality" and distinguish between physical and

social reality. I shall consider the rhetorical activity of the human

mind which produces symbolic reality constructs that allows human

knowledge and directs human action, and which when communicated and / shared establish the system of human relations which constitute social

reality. I shall consider how social reality acts as a self-perpetuating

system via socialization and how universes of discourse provide the

symbolic matrix of a society, which if restructured may produce

empirically manifest changes in the social order.

REALITY

The term "reality" is derived "from Medieval Latin realitas

and ultimately from a form of the Latin word meaning to exist.

Reality is simply that which exists. Though the derivation is

etymologically clear, it is not philosophically precise. In

order to determine the reality of an entity, one must consider

the nature of its existence. How must it exist? Where must it

exist? Common sense would tell us that horses exist while unicorns do not. Unicorns are simply some figment of the human imagination-- which exist in the human mind. Despite the objective non-existence of unicorns, people can think and communicate readily concerning unicorns. Most people "know" what a unicorn is. They take for granted that unicorns do not exist in the same sense as horses. 61

One might say that horses are a part of objective reality, while

unicorns are a part of subjective reality. Or in roughly

equivalent terms, one might say that horses exist outside and

independent of the human mind, while unicorns exist "inside" and are dependent upon the human mind. It is not my purpose to make a definitive explication of the meaning of the term '.'reality."

Rather, I merely wish to suggest that there are orders of reality and that all that is real does not exist in the same sense. The distinction between objective and subjective reality and independent and dependent existence are useful preliminary distinctions. They are useful in aiding an understanding of the differences between physical and social reality. Physical reality is objective and independent. Social reality is ultimately subjective and dependent.

These two genres of reality are essentially different. To view social reality in terms of physical reality is to partially misconstrue it. Yet, such a misconstruction is ingrained in the common sense notion of reality in which physical and social reality are not differentiated. Physical reality exists independent of man, its laws immutable but empirically experienced. Unaided man cannot fly in the air, walk on water or through walls, breathe underwater, or numerous other behaviors which the laws of physical reality do not allow. And, of course, these laws of nature are universal and inescapable. Physical reality is not a human creations and its governing laws cannot be humanly recreated.

Social reality is a human creation and capable of transformation. 62

One need make only the most casual inspection of societies and

cultures to witness an enormous variation in language, custom,

dress, architecture, norms, attitudes and values. There are multiple social realities; all creations of the human mind; all

capable of transformation. The empirically manifest aspects of

social realities (the institutions, the patterns of behavior,

the languages) exist as human constructions. And their dependent existence is sustained or transformed by ongoing human interaction.

KNOWLEDGE AS HUMAN CONSTRUCTION

The concept of knowledge has a range of meanings which vary with its philosophical and common sense usages. Philosophically, a claim to knowledge is a claim to an absolute and necessary truth.

In the commonsense usage of everyday life a claim "to know" is much less stringent. It refers to what is taken to be the case. Thus, the assumptions of a culture may be taken as "known" within a given society. Yet what is the nature of human knowledge? In what sense does human knowledge exist? How is something known?

Human knowledge exists as a symbolic construction. It exists as created by the constitutive powers of the human mind. Knowledge requires a knower. It is noteworthy that:

The results of philosophical investigation at least since the time of Immanuel Kant show that "knowledge" can only mean the "mapping" of experienced reality by some observer. It cannot mean the "grasping" of reality itself. In fact, philosophical progress has produced the conclusive insight that there can be no such thing as the direct and "true" apprehension of "reality" it­ self. More strictly speaking, we are compelled to define "knowledge" as the communicable mapping of some aspect of experienced reality by an observer in symbolic terms. 63

This definition is more than an arbitrary definition of a mere word; it is, we argue, the only possible definition of "knowledge" that has any meaning at all. It implies that knowledge is by its very nature relational. It emerges in the relation­ ship between the observer and the reality which he observes, as the result of mapping operations. The observer plots so to speak, what he sees in terms of some set of rules that define what is a permissible map. 2

•iOne discovers in Kant’s philosophy the view that man can have no

direct knowledge of physical reality. Man's understanding of

nature, his "knowledge" is always a symbolic content of human

consciousness. For Kant, this symbolic content which constitutes

"our understanding of nature arises in the special way in which 3 the human mind assembles, orders, and shapes our sense perceptions."

Knowledge exists only as a symbolic content of our consciousness.

Whether it be knowledge of horses or unicorns, physical or social

reality, it is a symbolic construction--a product of the human mind.

The critical philosophy of Immanuel Kant is developed in his

The Critique of Pure Reason (1781). From that year on "the 'critical

philosophy’ has dominated the speculative roost of Europe . . .

until today its essential theorems are the axioms of all mature

philosophy.Unfortuantely for our purposes Kant's "thought is

insulated with a bizarre and intricate terminology."^ In order to

avoid this terminological bog, I shall continue to rely on secondary

sources. It should be noted that our concern is not focused on an

explication of Kant per se, rather it is upon understanding the

implication of a philosophy which is based on a realization that

the operations of the human mind determine the ordering of the 64

random flux of sensations into perception and knowledge. If

Kant’s analysis is correct "the world as we know it is a construction, a finished product, almost--one might say--a manufactured article, to which the mind contributes as much by its moulding forms as 6 the thing contributes by its stimuli." Knowledge is a construction of the human mind. The mind is as important to knowledge as the reality it maps. The critical philosopher views'the mind - as active, which is a decisive break with the Aristotelian notion of the mind as passive (see Chapter I, p. 15) or the Lockean view of mind as "tabula rasa." Ernst Cassirer, a modern disciple of Kant, notes

It is one of the first essential insights jof • I ' critical philosophy that objects are not given to consciousness in a rigid, finished state, in their naked "as suchness," but that the relation of representation to object presupposes ah in­ dependent, spontaneous act of consciousness. The object does not exist prior to and outside of synthetic unity but is constituted only by this synthetic unity; it is not fixed form that imprints itself on consciousness but is the product of a formative operation effected by the basic instru­ mentality of consciousness, by intention and pure thought.7

Cassirer is more specific in explaining that the mind is "symbolically active in the construction of all its universes of perception and g discourse." Thus, the mind creates a symbolic construction of reality.

While the mind is necessarily symbolically active, variation is possible in reality construction. There is a social relativity of knowledge or what is taken to be known realities in differing societies. There are observable differences "between societies in terms of what is taken for granted as ’knowledge* in them.1,9 65

Thus, in societies which contemporary western civilization views

as primitive "possession by demons" or "magic" may be taken as

"real." Yet a modern American businessman is likely to reject

such reality constructions as nonsense. He would regard possession

as mental illness and acts of magic as trickery or illusion. The

primitive and the modern have different social realities, different

conceptual worlds. In explaining such social relativity, Holzner

is consistent with critical philosophy in noting that:

knowledge is always the knowledge of an observer and therefore inescapably relational in nature . . . The nature of this relationality is defined by the observer's perspective or frame of reference, the structure of the symbolic system he uses, its anchorage in his experience and by the rules that specify particular ways and channels of communicating the resulting meanings to others: all of this is necessarily reflected in the theories or "maps" of reality that he forms.

The nature of human knowledge is inescapably symbolic and ultimately < . ’ • nt '■" . - ’owra t> »■ dependent on the powers of the human mind. This knowledge is

stored and communicated primarily through language. These symbolic constructions may accurately or inaccurately map reality as it exists independent of human conceptualization. Those reality constructions which over time are demonstrated to be inaccurate and thus dysfunctional tend to be modified or discarded. In a sense, over time men attempt to improve the "fit" between symbolic constructions and reality.

HUMAN ACTION AND REALITY CONSTRUCTS

Students of human behavior have tended to adopt the perspective of students of physical behavior; that is, they have taken the 66

physical sciences as their model. To an extent, such an approach

is applicable to the study of human behavior. However, once the

neuro-chemical-physiological aspects of human behavior are examined

the utility of this approach is limited. It is limited because

it forces human activity within a social reality into the conceptual

mold appropriate to physical reality. It fails to distinguish

between the nature of physical and social reality. It tends to reduce human action to mere motion.H In such a reduction, the

intentionality, the meaning of human actions is forgotten. And in

social action it is the meaning which is of critical importance;

because it is shared meaning created and maintained in social

interaction which defines and propogates social reality.

Indeed social behavior cannot be understood unless the meaning

of the behavior is understood. For instance, a man beats a child.

What does this motion mean? Does it make a difference if the man

is not a stranger, but a father disciplining the child? Obviously

it does, even though the motions could l.have been identical.

Approaching human action in terms of physical reality, prevents

the student from recognizing that within a social reality "language

does not simply symbolize a situation or object which is already

there in advance; it makes possible . thesexistencefor the'appe'afance of that situation or object, for it is a part of the mechanism 12 whereby that situation or object is created." This capacity of language to create situations that enable one to understand that the same motions do not necessarily constitute the same actions is of crucial importance in understanding human social behavior. 67

It suggests that merely knowing the motions involved does not tell

us what the act meant.

While in its motion sense, human action is obviously constrained

by physical and biologically based limitations, in its meaning sense,

human action is only symbolically constrained. This distinction is

captured in the philosophical distinction between brute and institu­

tional facts. Brute facts of human behavior are based on a description

of physical motion. Institutional facts involves attached symbolisms which may direct and give meaning to such motions. Institutional

facts cannot be understood when reduced to motions. For instance,

though "a marriage ceremony, a baseball game, a trial . . . involve

a variety of physical movements, states and raw feels ... a

specification of one of these events only in such terms is not so

far a specification of it as a marriage ceremony, baseball game, or a 13 trial." John R. Searle, a prominent philosopher of language, explains that institutional facts "unlike brute facts, presuppose the existence of certain human institutions . . . (and) these

'institutions' are systems of constitutive rules."'''4

Illustrating this distinction between brute and institutional

facts and thé inadequacy of a brute fact explanation of human behavior, Searle writes:

imagine what it would be like to describe institutional facts in purely brute terms. Let us imagine a group of highly trained observers describing an American football.game in statements only of brute facts. What could they say by way of description? Well, within certain areas a good deal could be said, and using statistical techniques certain 'laws' could even be formulated. For example, we can imagine that after a time our observer would discover the law 68

of periodic clustering: at statistically regular intervals organisms in like colored shirts cluster together in a roughly circular fashion (the huddle). Furthermore, at equally regular intervals, circular clustering is followed by linear clustering (the teams line up for play), and linear clustering is followed by the phenomenon of linear interpenetration. Such laws would be statistical in character, and none the worse for that. But no matter how much data of this sort we imagine our observers to collect and no matter how many inductivehgeneralizations we imagine-ithemoto make from the data, they still have not described American football. What is missing from that de­ scription? What is missing are all those concepts which are backed by constitutive rules, concepts such as touchdown, offside, game, points, first down, time out, etc., and consequently what is missing are all the true statements one can make about a football game using those concepts. The missing state­ ments are precisely, what describes the phenomenon on the field as a game of football. The other descriptions, the descriptions of the brute facts, can be explained in terms of the institutional facts. But the institutional facts can only be explained in terms of the constitutive rules which underlie them.33

The game of football is a human creation. The playing of the game is governed by linguistically present rules. To understand the motions of the players one must understand the goals of the game.

These goals are implicit in the linguistic construction of the game.

In Chapter III the relationship between language and action was considered (see pages 55 and 56). The ability of language to direct or mediate human behavior is empirically supported.

It follows that to understand human behavior fully one must also discern the terms which directed the behavior: that is to under­ stand how the human mind utilizes linguistic symbolism to direct action. A variety of theorists have noted the importance of a systematic approach in explaining human action. Kenneth Burke suggests that the orientation of an individual must be considered

in explaining human action. He explains orientation as:

a bundle of judgements as to how things were, how they are, and how they may be. The act of response, as implicated in the character that an event has for us, shows clearly the integral relationship between our metaphysics and our conduct. For in a statement as to how the world is, we have implicit judgements not only as to how the world may become but also to what means we should employ to make it so.16

A similar insight is expressed in Kenneth Boulding’s statement that 11 "my Image of the world . . . what I believe to be true; my subjective knowledge . . . largely governs my behavior.Burke’s 'Jbundle of judgements" and Boulding’s "Image" necessarily have a symbolic existence in the mind. Both are referring to symbolic constructions of reality. The insight of both of these theorists can be stated differently such that its coherence with the perspective of rhetoric as reality construction is clearer. An actor is alway acting out of the reality constructions he holds. He responds to his symbolic construction of reality, which is what he takes reality to be. The mental processes by which he constructs this symbolic reality also direct his modes of action within it. Human action is a constructed reality which is given meaning by the terms which direct it.

SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED REALITY

Sociologically, "The basic question on symbolic function is: 18 How do symbols create and sustain order in social relationships?"

This is a fundamental question since "there is no necessary relation­ ship between men imposed on them by blind nature. To the social and political and economic forms of relationship by which men live, 70

19 there would seem to be no end." Yet within a given society,

relatively stable recurrent patterns of behavior are observable.

How are such recurrent patterns to be explained? One explanation „20 is that such behavior is a consequence of "communicational realities.

That is as a consequence of response to an internalized symbolic

construction of reality which is created and maintained by social

interaction. Herbert Blumer, a leading theorist of the symbolic

interactionist school of sociology, explains that:

social interaction is a process that forms human conduct instead of being merely a means or a setting for the expression or release of human conduct. Put simply, human beings in interacting with one another have to take account of what each other is doing or is about to do; they are forced to direct their own conduct or handle their situ­ ations in terms of what they take into account. Thus, the activities of others enter as positive factors in the formation of their own conduct.2^

Meaning is generated in human interactions as the human mind "is

constantly carrying on a process of symbolic transformation of

the experiental data that comes to it." Though not all symbolism

is linguistic, it is linguistic symbolism that is "a fundamental emergent from, and a basic instrument and primary determinant of, 23 societal life.” Indeed "most of what happens socially ... is mediated by language, incited and propelled by language, instructed 24 and programmed by language, directed and controlled by language.”

Language is the dominant form of social symbolism. It is basic to the existence of a culture or society. It has been suggested that

"language is the central manifestation of culture . . ." and "Culture, however one defines it, would be impossible without language." 71

Culture would be impossible because language is the primary code

for social communication. With the ongoing social use of

language, knowledge is stored and transmitted to new generations.

Such storage and transmission is necessary if the culture is to

continue and grow.

In considering the relationship between language and culture

it is important to recall the contingent nature of social reality.

Social reality is created by men and dependent upon human interaction

for it’s continuance. Social order is not given or derived from any natural order or any physical or biological necessities.

Fundamentally,

Social order exists only as a product of human activity. No other ontological status may be ascribed to it with­ out hopelessly obfuscating its empirical manifestations. Both in its genesis (social order is the result of past human activity) and its existence in any instant of time (social order exists only insofar as human activity continues to produce it) it is a human product.26

In what manner does language contribute to the production of a stable social order? Sociologist Burkhart Holzner explains the function of symbolism which would include language. He writes:

Social structure, the relatively stable patterns or relationships, of roles, groups, institutions in society, must be understood as an achievement resulting from the process, of constructive stabilization of the fluent interactive process. We have emphasized the importance of symbolic representation for this "con­ struction of social structure," which provides some f firm anchorage points for the orientation of an individual to his social environment. The process includes more than the orderliness made possible by symbolic orientation; it involves further the co­ ordination of overt action, and the regulation of situations in which the action takes place, '(emphasis added) 72

It is through symbolization that the "fluent interactive process"

is stabilized. And in broadly shared systems of symbolization such

as language there is a resistance to idiosyncratic change. That is

to say that within a given language community an individual will

be pressured to communicate according to the range of stabilized meanings of his language. In a sense, changing the meanings of

commonly shared symbols is "not allowed." It is not allowed because

serious instability in the shared meanings of linguistic symbols would impede linguistic communication. Of course, stabilization is only relative. There is always a mixture of shared and idiosyncratic meaning in linguistic communication. Yet what begins as idiosyncratic meaning may become shared and eventually the primary sense usage of a term. Such change of meaning does occur, though it is usually gradual. Other symbols are discarded and become meaningless when 2 8 they are not "ongoingly 'brought to life’ in actual human conduct."

THE REELEXIVITY OF SOCIAL REALITY

In attempting to explain the stability of social reality I have referred to the influence of the language community in resisting idiosyncratic change. In this I am viewing the language community as a system with stable structures and a potential for growth. Such a system to maintain stability requires more conformity from its individual members than the utilization of language with the commonly held meanings intended. In any given historical period, the members of a community believe in a symbolically constructed social reality. The members of the community are not likely to view the 73

social reality they take for granted as a contingent reality. They

will view their social reality simply as "the way it is." New

members of the community must learn "the way it is” and act

accordingly. Indeed, "the individual must become psychologically 29 organized in a socialization process." Existent social realities

influence ongoing human interaction. This influence is ''due to the

fact that:

social structure channels interaction into patterns, which themselves are co-determined by the reality constructs which the participants hold or evolve. Modes of reality construction enter with other determinants of the interaction process into the shaping of social structure itself. Images of society, social beliefs, images of other persons are elements in this process.30

Social reality, though created and stabilized by human symbolic i i .-.¿fu, Iuj an t ipiricax-., ' LI interaction, has an empirically observable existence. Parts of

social reality confront the individual in their empirical manifestations.

Social institutions such as churches, governments, the police or armed forces are observable in their existence and function. Though such institutions are dependent on social supports for their con­ tinuing existence, they are minimally effected by the solitary in­ dividual. For the individual cannot simply wish them away, as long as others support the institution its external existence is persistent. Moreover, these institutions exercise a coercive power on the individual "by the sheer force of their facticity and throughtcoñtrolbmechanisms." In its objective existence broadly held social realities act to force the new members to accept and act in terms of the prevailing reality constructions. Thus, 74

the man embedded in a traditional society hardly thinks of himself as separate or separable from his group. He is engulfed by his culture. He accepts the traditions, beliefs, and way of life of his group so completely that he is not even aware that he is accepting them. He is a culturally e defined man.32

Or as Kenneth Burke puts it "Insofar as the individual mind is a

group product, we may look for the same patterns of relationship no between the one and the many in any historical period.

An individual born into a culture or society with a pre-

established social reality, a common code for expressing meaning,

and modes of social interaction will be "expected to learn the

requirements for behavior found in the culture and to conform to *5 / them most of the time." The process by which the individual

learns these requirements or the content of the social realities of his community may be referred to as socialization or enculturation.

Though certain fine line distinctions might be drawn between

socialization and enculturation, for the purposes of this dissertation the terms will be considered synonomous. Berger and Luckmann note that language is of considerable importance in socialization. They explain that while

The specific contents that are internalized in primary socialization vary, of course, from society to society. Some are found everywhere. It is language that must be internalized above all. With language, and by means of it, various motivational and interpretative schemes are internalized as institutionally de fined.^5

In the socialization process the child must learn more about language than just vocabulary and grammar. He must learn patterns of language which direct thought and action. These patterns of language provide 75

the "motivational and interpretative schemes" to which Berger and

Luckmann refer. Thus the child might learn that:

Brave little boys do not cry.

Brave little boys are good.

All little boys should be brave.

Little boys are either brave or cowardly.

Prom these verbal equations, the little boy who is hurt will attempt

to control his tears in order to be "brave and good." He will

regard other little boys who cry as "cowardly and not good.” Those who cry are not acting as they "should." Without language these

reactions would be impossible. Only through language can men

justfiy or legitimatize their activities.

The legitimatizing process is verbal. For example, "One must be brave because one wants to become a real man; one must perform the rituals because otherwise the gods will be angry; one must be loyal to the chief because only if one does will the gods support one in q Z" times of danger; and so on." Terms are linked such that one set of terms is justified by another. In this way systems of relationship between terms develops.

The system of relationship the child learns in socialization is restricted, since the child has no exposure to alternative systems.

He has no choice as to his significant others and "his identification with them is quasi-automatic .* . . his internalization of their 37 particular reality is quasi-inevitable." The child does not regard his internalized reality as particular or isolated. He 76

regards it as general and universal -- the "only existent or

conceivable world." The reality constructed in primary socialization

is certain and

accomplishes what (in hindsight, of course) may be seen as the most important confidence trick that society plays on the individual--to make appear as necessity what is in fact a bundle of contingencies and thus to make meaningful the accident of his birth.

Phenomenologically, this confidence trick leads to a recognition

that "the social world transcends? my everyday life. I was born 39 into a preorganized social world which will survive me.” Or

as Berger and Luckmann explain emphasizing the importance of

language in social relations:

I apprehend the reality of everyday life as an ordered reality. Its phenomena are prearranged in patterns that seem to be independent of my ap­ prehension of them and that impose themselves upon the latter. The reality of everday life appears already objectified, that is, constituted by an order of objects that have been designated as objects before my appearance on the scene. The language used in everyday life continuously provides me. with the necessary objectifications and posits the order with­ in which these make sense and within which everday life has meaning for me. I live in a place that is geographically designated; I employ tools, from can openers to sports cars, which are designated in the technical vocabulary of my society; I live with a web of Lhuman relationships, from my chess club to the United. States of America, which are also ordered by means of vocabulary. In this manner language marks the co-ordinates of my life in society and fills that life with meaningful objects.40 (emphasis added)

It is through the internalization of language in socialization that social realities are created anew in the minds of the young and thus perpetuated. Ultimately,

Each socialized person, then, is a society in min- 77

iature. Once he has incorporated the culture of his group, it becomes his perspective, and he can bring this frame of reference to bear upon all new situations that he encounters. The fact that most people are able to, control themselves in this manner is what makes society possible. In this connection, it should be emphasized that when Mead spoke of the "generalized other," he was not referring to people but to a shared perspective. (emphasis added)

Thus,

Through the learning of a culture (and subcultures, which are the specialized cultures found in particular segments of society) men.are able to predict each other's behavior most of the time and guage their own behavior to the predicted behavior of others . . . A society can be said to exist only when this . . . is true.42 (emphasis added)

In this view "society consists of the images which its members have of it, their beliefs about social reality, their view of each other, of their roiles, or the roles of their partners, their knowledge of groups, organization, and of institutions that have some importance 43 for them.” These images are necessarily symbolic and dominately linguistic. Linguistic symbolism is the primary mode of social discourse through which men communicate, store, and modify their conceptions of reality. Men are guided in their social behavior by language construction internalized in social interaction. A social situation cannot be understood merely by locating it in space and time, it must be understood in the terms people apply to it which stabilize its meaning. Men do not act directly in response to their environmental situation, rather they react to what they conceive that situation is or means.

The assignment of meaning is guided by their language and ...the 78

social reality they "know." Yet, it is obvious that, in a large

modern industrial society and probably in more primitive societies

as well, all men do not act identically toward what appears to

be the same situation. This difference in action requires explanation.

In explaining this difference it should be recalled that while

language directs human action it is often possible to employ

alternative language constructions to any particular event. Thus,

two people who act differently may be directed by differing definitions of the situation. People with differing definitions of the situation are responding to different meanings and are directed terms.

UNIVERSES OF DISCOURSE

The operation of language in human thought and action is complex.

Complex in that the operation of single terms is dependent on their place in larger systems of symbolism. These systems of symbolism have been termed universes of discourse. Tamotsu Shibutani explains the concept of universes of discourse at its broadest level in stating:

In each social world there develops a universe of ' discourse. Pertinent experiences are categorized in particular ways, and a special set of symbols is used to refer to them. The argot of soldiers, prostitutes, and drug addicts, as well as the dialects of ethnic minorities, differ from the standard tongue of the larger community, and these linguistic differences further accentuate social distance from outsiders. Each social world, then is acculture area, the boundaries of which are set neither by territory nor formal group membership but by the limits of effective communication. A social world is an orderly arena which serves as a stage on which each participant can ca'rve out a career. There are special norms of conduct, as set of values, a prestige ladder,, and a common outlook toward life--a Weltanschauung.44 (emphasis added) 79

Within each such Weltanschauung there are rules which govern the operation of the symbolic system. These rules

structure and limit the realm of the symbolically possible. The actually experienced'.world* thus merely represents a special case of these states of affairs which could be symbolically represented, and it is normally a special case of the narrower range of states of affairs which, according to prevailing theories, can be thought of as possible. The opening up of a realm of possibilities and probabilities enhances further the flexibility of the observer's stance towards what he experiences as actual.45

Ultimately "the symbolic universe is conceived of as the matrix of all socially objectivated and subjectively real meanings, the entire historic society and the entire biography of the individual are seen as events taking place within this universe."46 pn theory

"the symbolic universe provides a comprehensive integration of all discrete institutional processes. The entire society makes sense.

Particular institutions and roles are legitimated by locating them 47 in a comprehensively meaningful world." A society is an empirical manifestation of a universe of discourse. The society may be under­ stood in terms of its universe of discourse.

Georges Gusdorf vievs the creation of a symbolic universe of discourse as a basic human activity. He explains’:

The power of language ... is to constitute where incoherent sensations leave off, a universe to the measure of man. Each individual who comes into the world resumes for himself that labor of the human species, essential to it from its inception. To come into the world is to begin speaking (prendre la parole), to transfigure experience into a universe of discourse.48

In fulfillment of this labor different groups of people have created 80

different universes of discourse. That is whatever one apprehends

as "the actual reality ... is symbolically but one of all 49 possible constellations." As Shibutani indicated each social world develops its own universe of discourse. Within each language many universes of discourse are possible; and even with a society distinctly different sub-universes of discourse may exist. Holzner

indicates:

There may be as many "sub-universes" as there are different vital concerns of ours, and different modes of symbolic representation. Prom this per­ spective, the self and the real world appear differentiated. We must admit now to many different ways

Sub-universes of discourse provide for a variety of perspectives which "greatly increases the problem of establishing a stable symbolic canopy for the entire society."33 It creates-problems because individuals operating from differing sub-universes of discourse are motivated by differing patterns and orders of symbolism.

Increasing numbers of sub-universes of discourses increases the problems involved in establishing a shared hierarchy of symbolic priorities or reciprocal relationships.

There is some conceptual confusion surrounding the notions of sub-universes and universes of discourse. Is a universe of discourse composed of a set of sub-universes? Can any individual member of a society internalize "the" universe of discourse of his society?

These are puzzling questions; especially when applied to modern societies. If a universe of discourse consists of sub-universes within the society, it does not seem probable that any member of 81

a modern mass society could internalize such a vast body of

discourse. In this sense, a universe of discourse is an idealized

concept imperfectly attained and internalized during socialization.

Men operate within their specific sub- and somewhat idiosyncratic

universes of discourse.

Within a given society individuals will have a range of similar

internalized reality constructs. Individual differences will exist 52 as "persons differ from each other in their construction of events."

The existence of multiple sub-universes and idiosyncratic differences poses problems for social cohesion. Contingent realities require human belief and consequent action to be maintained. It requires

"faith" from the believer. And as Berger and Luckmann point out:

"The appearance of an alternative symbolic universe poses a threat because its very existence demonstrates empirically that one’s own universe is less than’inevitable."53

ALTERNATIVE REALITY CONSTRUCTIONS

Earlier in this chapter in considering the nature of human knowledge, it was noted that men do not know reality directly but know only symbolic constructions of reality. Given differing universes or sub-universes of discourse a reality-may not be under­ stood in the same or even semantically equivalent terms. Thus, the terminological disputes over "What it really is?"

Students of critical philosophy as propounded by Ernst Cassirer in his Philosophy of Symbolic Forms view the symbol as basic to all thought and see "symbolic form compris(ing) . . . all activities characteristic of the human mind, including language, myth, art 82

and so on."54 Cassirer's philosophy suggests that myth, art and

science are modalities of construction for what has here been

referred to as universes of discourse. His philosophy argues

that these modes are different ways of using symbols in "experience­

accounting.Cassirer criticises those who in focusing on a

single mode or "perspective of symbolization . . . have lost sight of the equal validity of . . . other . . . legitimate paths to what

. . . may be referred to as the 'real.'"5^ Thus,

All arts create symbols for a level of reality which cannot be reached in any other way. A picture and a poem reveal elements of reality which cannot be approached scientifically. In the creative work of art we encounter reality in a dimension which is closed for us without such works. The (symbol) . . . not only opens up dimen­ sions of reality which otherwise would remain unapproachable but also unlock dimensions;: arid elements of our soul ... A great play gives us not only a new vision of the human scene, but it opens up hidden depths of our own being. Thus we are able-to receive what the play reveals to us in reality. There are within us dimensions of which we cannot become aware except through symbols.

Art, myth, and science can exist in all language communities.

Members of such communities learn to operate with these differing modes of reality construction. A poem may not express a scientific truth and vice versa. The arts cannot be equivalently translated into the modality of science and vice versa. Both are nonetheless important aspects of humanly created systems of meaning.

Human action may be described and predicted from various symbolic constructions. Theorists may utilize symbolic constructions such as "drives, attitudes, values, reference groups, and mediating responses" in explaining human behavior. In discussion and debate 83

between competing theories and theorists, many of these symbolic

constructions become reified (taken as existing functional entities)

and their nature as hypothetical constructs is forgotten. Attitudes and values have no objective reference. They are symbolic constructions of reality--no more, no less. But they are meaningful to the theorists who utilize them. Thus,

Neither the Voudun gods nor libidinal energy may exist outside of the world defined in their respective social contexts. But in these contexts they do exist by virtue, of social definition and are in­ ternalized as realities in the course of socialization. Rural Haitians are possessed and New York intellectuals are neurotic. Possession and neurosis are thus constituents, of both objective and subjective reality in these contexts.^8

What is taken as "real" is defined by society. People will behave according to the reality constructions they know. Even neurosis and possession can be linguistically scripted behavior.

Like the scientist the artistic theorist must developjand utilize language in his analysis and evaluation of an event. Theorists operating from different theories or sub-universes of discourse are likely to express their conclusions in different terminology. In rhetorical criticism the neo-Aristotelian and the Burkean critic operate from differing constructions of the rhetorical process.

They analyze and order rhetorical phenomena into differing patterns.

Both critics might seek to explain why a particular speech was effective. The neo-Aristotelian might explain effectiveness in terms of ethos-pathos-logos and the enthymeme. The Burkean critic might explain effectiveness in terms of pentadic ratios and 84

identification. Metaphorically speaking, they slice the rhetorical

pie in different places but both attempt to slice the complete

pie. It is quite possible for alternative symbolic constructions

of reality to be of equal value and pragmatic utility. Of course,

it is also possible that one system is superior to another. However,

a judgement of superiority between competing sub-universes of discourse

is extremely difficult. In the case of neo-Aristotelian and Burkean

theories a judgement might be based on their comparative predictive power concerning the key common term persuasion. It may be that

the existence of common terms between sub-universes will allow

two sub-universes to be integrated such that the realizations which

they do not share may be maintained. When two sub-universes of discourse collide possibilities of integration should be explored and all concerned" should treat the conflict in terms of comparing alternative constructions of reality rather than in terms of what something really is.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CLASSIFICATION

To illustrate the importance of how words applied to things effects behavior consider Irving J. Lee’s examples of some verbal disputes. Lee wrote:

two little boys were playing on a sand pile. One heaped the sand up and said, "It is a mountain." The other boy insisted, "No, it isn't. It's a house." They argued this way for a few minutes until their mother said: "You stop your fighting. Neither of you is right. . .That's really just a pile of sand." What was it really? Most biologists say that bacteria are plants, but a recent decision of the Court of Custom and Patent Appeals said that bacteria are animals. The Supreme 85

Court once decided that the tomato was a vegetable, although contesting scientists said it was a fruit.59

Though the actual physical characteristics of an object are un­ changed by human terminological disputes, these disputes should not be dispelled as "mere rhetoric" or "mere semantics." What an object is to be called and the relationship of that term to other terms in the language is highly significant in regard to understanding human action. The child who labels a pile of sand a "mountain" will play with it differently than the child who labels it a "house." That courts, in contradiction to scientific interpretation, chose to view bacteria as animals and tomatoes as vegetables has profound affects on the legal status of those entities. It determines what legal regulations "validly" apply to them. In these disputes what is ultimately at question is the place of the relationship between terms within a universe of discourse. Differences in classification and the relationship between terms produce differing action potentials.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The following propositions are supported in the preceding discussion:

1. Physical Reality is independent of man.

2. Social Reality is a human creation

3. All human knowledge of reality is based on

symbolic constructions.

4. To understand human action, one must discover the

terms which govern it and give it meaning. 86

5. Symbolic constructions (especially when widely shared)

stabilize the otherwise fluid social interactive process.

6. Socialization tends to maintain existing realities.

7. Universes and sub-universes of discourse are systems of

vocabulary relationship which may construct and order

reality differently.

These propositions underlie an understanding of the social construction of reality. In the following chapter in considering the maintenance and reconstruction of social reality, the rhetorical implications of this set of propositions will emerge. 87

CHAPTER IV - ENDNOTES

Iprank Ford Nesbit. Language, Meaning and Reality. New York: Exposition Press 1955. p. 52.

2 Burkhart Holzner. Reality Construction in Society. Cambridge: Schenkman Publishing Company, Incorporated 1968. p. 20. \

3Ibid., p. 74.

Slill Durant. The Story of Philosophy. New York: Simon and Schuster 1963. p. 192.

3Ibid., p. 201.

6Ibid., p. 206.

7Ernst Cassirer. The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Volume II. Translated by Ralph Mannheim. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955. p. 29. o °Carl H. Hamburg. Symbols and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer. Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague. 1956. p. 48.

Q Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality. Garden City: Doubleday and Company 1966. pp. 2-3.

'''^Holzner, p. 23.

11 Kenneth Burke. A Grammar of Motives. Los Angeles: University of California Press 1969. p. 136.

12 George Herbert Mead. The Social Psychology of George Herbert Mead. Edited by Anselm Strauss. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1956. p. 180.

1 3 John R. Searle. Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1970. p. 51.

14 Ibid., p. 51.

15Ibid., pp. 52-53.

■'•^Kenneth Burke. Permanence and Change. New York: The Bobbs- Merrill Company 1954. p. 14. 88

17 Kenneth Boulding. The Image. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press 1968. pp. 5-6.

18 Hugh Dalziel Duncan. Symbols in Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. p. 19.

19 Lee Thayer. 'Communication Systems," in The Relevance of General Systems Theory. Edited by Ervin Laszlo. New York: George Braziller 1972. p. 106.

20Ibid., p. 106.

pi Herbert Blumer. Symbolic Interactionism. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall 1969. p. 8.

22 Susanne K. Langer. Philosophy in a New Key. Cambrige: Harvard University Press 1960. p. 43.

2Q JJoyce 0. Hertzler. A Sociology of Language. New York: Random House 1965. p. 23.

24 Ibid., p. 281.

25 Harry Warfel. Language - A Science of Human Behavior. Cleveland: Howard Allen, Incorporated 1962. pp. 181-182.

26ßerger and Luckmann, pp. 49-50.

^^Holzner, p. 72.

2 Q Berger and Luckmann, p. 70.

29 A. Irving Hallowell. Culture and Experience. New York: Schocken Books 1967. p. 5.

-^^Holzner, p. 18.

Q 1 J•‘•Berger and Luckmann, p. 57.

32john W., Garder. "Individual, Committment and Meaning," in Current Perspectives in Social Psychology. Second Edition. Edited by Edwin P. Hollander and Raymond G. Hunt. New York: Oxford University Press 1967. p. 83. 89

33Kenneth Burke. Permanence and Change. p. 159.

34 ...... Arnold M. Rose. Human Behavior and Social Processes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 13.

33Berger and Luckmann, p. 124.

36Ibid., p. 124.

5^Ibid., p. 124.

33Ibid., p. 124.

on " ...... Alfred Schutz. On Phenomenology and Social Relations. Edited by Helmut R. Wagner. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1970. p. 245.

^Berger and Luckmann, p. 21.

43Tamotsu Shibutani., . "Reference Groups and Social Control," in Human Behavior and Social Processes. Edited by Arnold M. Rose. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 132.

43Rose, pp. 9-10.

43Holzner, p. 72.

44Shibutani, "Reference Groups and Social Control," pp. 137-138.

43Holzner, p. 34.

¿^Berger and Luckmann, p. 89.

4^Ibid., p. 95.

48 Georges Gusdorf. Speaking. Translated by Paul T. Brockelman. Evanston: Northwestern University Press 1965. p. 9.

¿^Holzner, p. 7.

3®Ibid., p. 5.

5Berger and Luckmann, p. 80. 90

52 George A. Kelly. A Theory of Personality: The Psychology of Personal Constructs. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, Inc. 1963. p. 55.

53 Berger and Luckmann, p. 100. j3 54 Ludwig von Bertalanffy. "On the Definition of the Symbol," in Psychology and the Symbol. Edited by Joseph R. Royce. New York: Random House 1965. p. 42.

33Hamburg, p. 44.

38Ibid., p. 54.

37Joseph R. Royce. Psychology and the Symbol. New York: Random House 1965. pp. 20-21.

58 Berger and Luckmann, p. 162.

59 ...... -...... Irving J. Lee. Language Habits in Human Affairs. New York: Harper and Row, 1941. p. 227. 91

CHAPTER V:

REALITY MAINTENANCE AND RECONSTRUCTION 92

INTRODUCTION

Man has created his social realities,. Collectively he has

created all the symbolisms upon which his knowledge and creation

of reality depends. Man lives with his creations. Indeed, "Society

is £ human product. Society is an objective reality. Man is a social product."1 As was noted in the previous chapter, social

reality is reflexive. The new member of a society is socialized

in terms of the existing social realities of the time. Such

socialization tends to perpetuate the existing system. Yet social

reality is only relatively stable. Changes in social reality do

occur. A viable rhetorical theory must seek to understand the

dialectic processes of stability and change or in equivalent

terms the maintenance and reconstruction of social reality.

Symbolization is of key importance in the stabilization of

social reality. Systems of symbolization which in the case of

language stipulate vocabulary relationship tend to promote

stabilization. These systems of vocabulary relationship are called

universes of discourse and constitute the symbolic matrix which

structures human action. In modern mass societies a universe of

discourse is an idealized concept never fully attained in socialization.

Of course, the extent to which a universe of discourse is attained

by an individual is variable and continual growth is possible.

Whether such growth will occur depends on the individual (his

open-mindedness) and the range of his Vnew” experiences (new in

that they are not explained in his universe of discourse as

currently developed.) 93

When an individual experiences actions directed by a portion

of a universe of discourse that he has not internalized, he may be

uncertain as to the meaning of the act. Nonetheless, in attempting

to understand the act the individual must apply a symbolic construction

to the behavior. This symbolic construction may be accurate or

inaccurate depending on it's correspondence with the construction

of the actor(s). In order to understand the action "one has to get 2 inside the defining process of the actor." William I. Thomas

indicates that ''preliminary to any self-determined act of behavior

there is always a stage of examination and deliberation which we

may call the definition of the situation." It is widely recognized

that "people with dissimilar perspectives" define situations that are

physically identical "differently." Thus, "A prostitute and a 4 social worker walking through a slum area notice different things."

Presumably both the prostitute and social worker are capable of

understanding each others actions. They may share portions of the

universe of discourse which explain each others actions. ,i

UNIVERSES OF DISCOURSE: FURTHER EXPLICATION

The universe of discourse may be viewed as "A system of relevances

and typiiications . . . part of the social heritage ... it functions as both a scheme of interpretation and as a scheme of orientation for each member of the in-group."3 That such a system can be shared

is significant in that it facilitates social interaction. Though

"interaction is always a tentative process,; a process of continuously testing the conception one has of the role of the other,"8 a shared system of role constructs and expectations provide one with "the 94

option of responding to the attributes of that classification rather than the attributes of the individual."? That a social worker and

a prostitute notice different things is due in part to their

identities as "social worker" or "prostitute” and the relevances

stipulated in the terminological clusters closest to that role

construct in a universe of discourse. The social worker and the

prostitute may share identical universes of discourse, but they

identify with and relate to others from different>■ segmentscof that

universe.

Insofar as universes of discourse direct human action, changes

in the relationship between terms within the universe of discourse is

a causative factor in social change. Though change in a universe of

discourse is not necessarily the sole factor in societal change, other

factors can be understood as effecting the universe of discourse.

Thus, changes in material conditions may induce changes in a

universe of discourse or changes in a universe of discourse may produce the empirical manifestations of change.

Jose Ortega Y Gasset seems to be concerned with what could be referred to as a prevailing universe of discourse in writing that:

At any given moment man lives in a world of con­ victions, the greater part of which are the convictions common to all men who dwell together in their era. This spirit of the times we have called the world ’in force,’ the ruling world, in order to show that it has not only the reality which our convictions lend to it, but also that it imposes itself upon us, whether we like it or not, as the most importantL ingredient in our surroundings. Just as man finds himself encased within the body which has fallen to him by chance and must live in it and with it, so he finds himself with the ideas of his time, and in them and with them--even though it be in the 95

peculiar fashion of contending aginst them--must he live. The mundo vigente that world in force, that spirit of the times--with which and in the operation of which we live, in view of which we decide our simplest actions--is the variable element of human life. When it changes., so does the argument, of the human drama.. Important modifications in the structure of human life depend much more on a change in this world than on a shift of characters, or races, etc. And as the theme of history is not human life, which is an affair of philosophy, but the changes, the var­ iations in human life, we hold that the primordial factor of history is the world which is "in force” in each period.$ (emphasis added)

The maintenance and reconstruction of prevailing universes of

discourse is a focal point for rhetorical concern.

Up to this point universes of discourse have been discussed in

a highly abstract manner. While a full-explication of a universe

of discourse is beyond the scope of this work and the knowledge

of this author, reality constructions embodied within the universe of discourse of this society may be presented or referred to in order to allow more specific consideration. Berger and Luckmann provide an example of a shared reality construction common within the prevailing universe of discourse of our society and discuss its

function. They write:

The social stock of knowledge includes knowledge of my situation and its limits. For instance, I know that I am poor and that, therefore, I cannot expect to live in a fashionable suburb. This knowledge is, of course, shared both by those who are poor themselves and those who are in a more privileged situation. Participation in the social stock of knowledge thus permits the "location" of individuals in society and the "handling" of them in the appropriate manner. This is not possible for one who does not participate in this knowledge, such as a foreigner.9

The social stock of knowledge is necessarily a symbolic construction 96

of reality, which is usually linguistically symbolized and is a

taken for granted aspect of the prevailing universe of discourse.

A verbal equation such as "The poor may not live in fashionable

suburbs,” could be viewed as a unit in aiuniverse of discourse.

This unit directs the poor not to seek accommodations in

fashionable suburbs and the rest of the society to refuse those members of the poor who do. Moreover, those poor who are refused should not be surprised by their experience, they could have predicted that outcome as probable without previous experience.

Their symbolic knowledge of social reality embodied in the internalized universe of discourse which they have learned in socialization implies!that prediction.

Perhaps a less1 obvious illustration of the impact of symbolic constructions is the prevailing treatment of spatial relationships.

The prevailing mode of conceptualizing spatial relations is Euclidean

Geometry. This system specifies that "The sum of the angles of a triangle is equal to 180’.”^® If in everyday life one were to speak of triangles with more or less than 180* it would violate the prevailing reality constructions. Such a violation would either be ignored, the speaker derogated for being "wrong," and argument to

"correct" him might ensue. Yet, no.n-Euclidean geometries in which triangles contain more or less than 180’ have been developed by

Bolyai (1775-1856), Lobatehewsky (1792-1856), and Riemann (1826-1866) .H

Presumably such non-Euclidean systems could be utilized as practically as Euclidean geometry if they were generally adopted within the society. That they have not been integrated into the commonly 97

held universe of discourse is a function of the adequacy of the

Euclidean system and its prior historic incorporation into the

universe of discourse. Moreover as these alternative systems seem

to contradict prevailing notions, any attempt at their general

introduction into the society would produce conceptual confusion.

In contrast, consider the current conversion in the United States

from the English to the Metric system of ’measurement. In this

case the units of measurement though different are not contraditory.

The measurements of one system may be equivalently expressed in

the terms of the other. Thus, the two systems can exist simultaneously

without producing conceptual confusion that necessarily accompanies

apparent contradiction. 12 A^universe of. discourse is a social product "with a history."

It is due to history that we might expect to see the term "patriot" 13 coupled with "Brutus," or "Washington," or "Parnell." A particular

document in American history provides an extended example of the

creation of an important portion of the prevailing universe of discourse. That document is the Constitution of the United States of America. As Kenneth Burke points out, a constitution setsiup an "’environment’ for future acts."^4 The Constitution of the

United States is the symbolic matrix which provides for the establishment of a political system. The Constitution’s place in the prevailing universe of discourse is that of a sub-universe or ideology. Holzner explains that:

By "ideology" we mean a limited aspect of the interpretive order of faiths and beliefs, namely, those 98

reality constructs and values which serve to legitimate the claims for power and prestige, and the activities of groups and their members. Ideologies are thus, legitimating symbolizations; that is they enable a group or a person to justify their activities . . . Ideologies typically assert the unity of the collectivities which they represent, or they are used as symbolic instruments for the achievement of unification . . . ideologies may serve epistemological functions by defining a collectivity's basic assumptions about the world andx especially about society.

Thé Constitution of the United States functions as an ideology.

Note that

a. National identification in America was achieved by the adoption of abstract, universal ideas which leg- itmated national independence and served as formative principles of the states and the Federal Union. The permanent influence of this system of ideas and values on the course of American history--the fixation of an ideological attitude--was due to the fact that the American people considered themselves a new kind of society. The very existence of the nation was bound up with the maintenance of those principles of social and political organization.15

The statement of these "universal ideas" is contained in the

■j Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. But it is the

Constitution of the United States which creates the political structure of the nation. Within this structure:

I Citizenship was the only criterion which made the individual a member of the national community; and national loyalty meant loyalty to the Constitution. The formative force of American national unity has been, then, the idea of citizenship; through the concept of citizAftshipfthe integrationZof state and society 'into~a’-nation has been achieved. 17

The Constitution provides an ideology which creates roles; President,

Vice-President, Senator, Representative, Supreme Court Justice; defines rights and delegates responsibilities. Its symbolism provides the basic direction of and justification for the American 99

government.

The portion of a universe of discourse which establishes the

processes of government is a vitally important area. And it is

an area of traditional rhetorical concern. Later in this chapter

a shift in meaning which transforms the U.S. Constitution will be

considered.

REALITY MAINTENANCE

In order to exist

Every society faces the task of upholding one or a few patterns of social life against the competition of an alternative. Concretely this means that every society must discipline? its members; persuading them to observe the accepted forms and dissuading them from pursuing conflicting objectives. "■'-8

This task is necessary in that "a culture can function efficiently

only if there is order and predictability in social life. We must

know, within reasonable limits, what behavior to expect from others,

what they expect from us, and what kind of society our children 19 should be prepared to live in." In upholding a pattern of social

life a fsbciety is involved in "social control--the means through 20 which people are led to fill their roles as expected." The

result of social control is the maintenance of existing realities.

The primary modality of social control is the socialization process.

As was noted in the previous chapter, social reality is reflexive

and new members are socialized in terms of the existing realities

of that time. In effect:

Socialization shapes our customs, our wishes, and our habits. Habit and custom are great time savers. They relieve us of the need for countless decisions . . . The members of a society are schooled in the 100

same customs and tend to develop much the same set of habits. Thus habit and custom are great standard­ izes of behavior within a group. If all members of a society share similar socialization experiences, they will voluntarily and unthinkingly act in very much the same ways. They will conform to social expectations without any conscious awareness that they are "conforming" or any serious thought of doing otherwise.21

Processes of socialization and social control have been widely

studied and analyzed. The effects of group pressure from primary and secondary groups, the operation of formal and informal controls, the application of force, and the coercive regulation of premiums and penalties is generally understood. Insofar as the general implications of socialization were discussed in the previous chapter, these processes need not be considered in detail here. What is significant is that "the reality of everyday life is ongoingly reaffirmed in the individuals interaction with others. Just as reality is originally internalized by a social process, so it is maintained in consciousness by social processes."25

In this reaffirmation

The most important vehicle of reality-maintenance is conversation. One may view the individual’s every­ day life in terms of the working away of a conversational apparatus that ongoingly maintains, modifies, and re­ constructs his subjective reality. Conversation means mainly, of course, that people speak with one another. This does not deny the rich aura of non-verbal communication that surrounds speech. Nevertheless speech retains a privileged position in the total conversational apparatus. It is important to stress, however, that the greater part of reality-maintenance is implicit, not explicit. Most conversation does not in so many words define the nature of the world. Rather, it takes place against the back­ ground of a world that is silently taken for granted. Thus an exchange such as, "Well, it’s time for me to get to the station,” and "Fine, darling, have a good day at the office" implies an entire world within which 101

these apparently simple propositions make sense. By — virtue of this implication the exchange confirms the subjective reality of this world.24

The confirmation of subjective reality by the implications of

converation is possible only insofar as the statement is understood

and interpreted in terms, of the universe of discourse which the

individual had previously internalized. It is only within the

broader universe of discourse that implications from statements may be drawn. GeorgesrGusdorf suggests this point and an additonal

factor involved in reality maintenance. He wrote:

It is words that make things and beings, that define the relations according to which the order of the world is constituted. To situate oneself in the world, for each of us, is to be at peace with the network of words that put everything in its place in the environment. Our lived space is a space of speaking, a pacified territory in which each name is a solution to a problem. Human relations themselves appear as a vast system of words which one gives and receives according to the rhythms established by social class and manners. The social order is defined by a code of correct denominations wherein all disagreement,, all. difference immediately appears as a sign of disharmony. If my wife, my children, my . friends, my. students,, my. superiors,, or my inferiors no longer address me by the names I rightfully, expect of t them, a certain anxiety arises: revolution '.threatens-- or mental disintegration. Anxiety about language always accompanies the alienation of man, rupture with the world, and it demands a return to order or the establishment of a new order. To put words in order is to put thought in order and to put men in order.23 (emphasis added)

Gusdorf’s reference to anxiety suggests a major factor of crucial significance in reality maintenance. This factor is dependent on .1 . ...Lolic fi -fr the symbolic functions of the human mind. Remembering that

Symbolic representation, and the construction of generalized maps of reality, lift the orientation system beyond the immediately given pattern of activity. Instead of being bound to the concrete 102

arrangements of which he is part, the person can and does orient himself in terms of symbolically defined type constructs of reality.^6

The significance of such symbolic mapping is that it allows man to

move in his environment with security, lacking such a map "he again

feels himself lost, at loose ends, without orientation.An

internalized universe of discourse provides a symbolic mapping of

reality which enables an individual to orient himself and act in

relation to the symbolic universe rather than merely react to

extramental reality. If the individual’s faith in his total universe

of discourse collapses, he is left in total confusion. As "structured 28 reality is . . . bounded by confusion and meaninglessness." One

who has lost faith in his universe of discourse cannot be secure in

his knowledge of self or others. The "world” is no longer meaningful.

Yet man strives to find meaning to order his life activities. And

a lack of faith in any symbolic construction of reality is a causative

factor in psychological disorder.29 Hypothetically even if such a

total loss of faith occurs, the individual will still utilize the

prevailing universe of discourse in his social interactions. Put

simply, mere loss of faith provides no alternative universes to

direct action. Thus, even the disenchanted and alienated do not

immediately threaten the symbolic universe of a society. Though

they provide fertile grounds for those who could provide developed

alternative constructions. In general however, "the symbolic universe is self-maintaining ... by the sheer facticity of

its objective existence."2^ 103

REALITY RECONSTRUCTION

Despite the relative stability of social reality due to the processes which tend to maintain it and limit change, it is possible to reconstruct and thus transform social reality. The

symbol producing capacities of the human mind which make possible

the initial construction of social reality also make possible its reconstruction.: The reconstruction of social reality involves changes in the prevailing universe of discourse. There are a number of types of change which are possible. The type of change which seems most frequent is the expansion of the size and structure of the universe of discourse. In virtually all areas of human knowledge the sub-universes of discourse are expanding as new and more detailed constructions are developed and communicated.

Generally these sub-universes are prevailing only within certain academic disciplines and only small portions of these sub-universes filter into the generally shared universe of discourse of the society.

Nonetheless even this expansion of the prevailing universe provides for the further general expansion should the society seek to in­ corporate greater segments from a sub-universe. Any member of the society may learn the more detailed symbols and structure of a sub-universe of discourse. After all the "social learning process, while slow in the young infant, becomes extremely rapid ... a normal alert person can learn over a hundred new meanings within 31 the space of an hour."

Other changes in the universe of discourse involve more fundamental changes in vocabulary and structure. These changes tend to occur in 104

response to "problems.” In general the prevailing universe of discourse "is'taken for granted by myself and by others until further notice, that is, until a problem arises that cannot be solved in 32 terms of it." The existence of a problem may generate the construction of a new symbolic solution depending on its significance.

Significant problems may produce reality shock. Reality shock may be described as:

the unanticipated feeling of unreality arising in situations of extreme disappointment or extreme success, or in situations in“,which the social support for our interpretation of reality is withdrawn, or in which we are confronted by entirely meaningless events. The consideration of reality shocks is of particular importance, showing that the borderline between the firm, solid territory of everyday reality and the realm of unreality is at times quite thin.33

Reality shock is related to reality reconstruction in that:

Sometimes the reality shock may be extremely threatening. One is compelled, at least moment­ arily, to adopt a stance?of utter doubt toward the natural attitudecandrtoward natural reality. In fact, reality may collapse, and it must then be reconstructed in a sometimes frantic search for an appropriate new perspective.3^

Such a severe reality shock represents "a crises in which we experience 35 the limitations of our meaning structures,"J the boundaries or paradoxes of our universe of discourse. Reality shocks may affect only a portion of the universe of discourse and require only the addition of a qualifier. Thus, a society in which the prevailing universe of discourse states that "one should not engage in violence" may add the qualification of "except in self-defense" if it finds itself surrounded by aggressive societies.

The history of scientific theory illustrates change in that 105

sub-universe of discourse. Thomas Kuhn draws a parallel between

political and scientific revolution. He writes:

Political revolutions are inaugurated by a growing sense, often restricted to a segment of the political community, that existing institutions have ceased adequately to meet the problems posed by an environment that they have in part created. In much the same way, scientific revolutions are inaugurated by a growing sense, again often restricted to a narrow subdivision of the scientific community, that an existing para­ digm has ceased to function adequately in the ex­ ploration of an aspect of nature to which that paradigm itself had previously led the way. In both political and scientific development the sense of malfunction that can lead to crises is prerequisite to revolution.36

Kuhn is concerned with conceptual revolution and his use of the

term "paradigm" is equivalent to what is here being termed a

sub-universe of discourse. In the operation of science, the

accumulation of knowledge which is not accounted for by a particular

paradigm eventually produces an effort to construct a more adequate

paradigm. The generation and accumulation of conflicting information

occurs in research conducted in normal science that is under the

prevailing "paradigm." As Kuhn indicates:

New and unsuspected phenomena are . . . repeatedly uncovered by scientific research, and radical new theories have again and again been invented by scientists . . . novelties of fact . . . produced inadvertently by a game played under one set of rules, their assimilation requires the elaboration of another set.37

The process by which the scientific community converts from an old paradigm to a new one is a rhetorical process that requires the

formulation of a new reality construction and its subsequent

communication. 106

In the political arena, though symbolism may remain stable the

interpretation of those symbols may change. Change of interpretation

means that a term is redefined or linked to different terms than

at a previous moment. Such a change occured with the U.S. Constitution

That diversity of interpretation concerning the Constitution has

existed is a historical commonplace. Yet a key "victory" for a

particular interpretation occurred with the passage of the Revenue

Collection Bill of 1833. The clash between two interpretations in­

volved a variety of speakers and issues. But the most basic issue

was a definition of the Constitution itself. Did the Constitution

form a compact between the States or a consolidated government created

by the people? This was the focal point of the controversy. Logically

dependent upon it was the constitutional status of the doctrines of

nullification and secession. John C. Calhoun and Daniel Webster

were the primary antagonists on this issue. Historian Charles M.

Wiltse indicates that:

Calhoun based his case on the meaning of the Constitution for those who wrote and ratified it, and in these terms his argument was basically sound, even though nullification itself was drawn from a Jeffersonian gloss rather than the literal text of the instrument. But Webster's interpretation was the only one compatible with the existence of a great national state, in a world every day growing more nationalistic.38

Though Calhoun is generally conceded to have won the arguments, he

did not win the votes. The Revenue Collection’Bill was passed and

Calhoun's interpretation suffered its first serious legislative defeat. It was Webster's interpretation which prevailed, which was consentually validated, and which threatened to defend itself by 107

force. Calhoun recognized the effect of the passage of the bill in

stating:

It would be idle to attempt to disguise that the bill will be a practical assertion of one theory of the Constitution against another--the theory advocated by the supporters of the bill that ours is a consolidated government, in which the states have no right, and in which, in fact, they bear the same relation as the counties do to the State; and against that view of the Constitution which considers it as a compact formed by the States as separate communities binding between the States, and not between the individual citizens.39

Though the Revenue Collection Bill passed and with it the consolidated

government interpretation became "official," Calhoun’s interpretation of the constitution did not die.

Throughout the Southern States it remained the dominant inter­ pretation. In the North and West the "offical" interpretation prevailed. The existence of these divergent and partially contra­ dictory interpretations of the Constitution indicated disunity within the society. Each interpretation congealed "into a reality in its own right, which, by its existence within the society, challenges the reality status" of theùother.40 in the case where one universe is offically sanctioned as'was the case with Webster’s interpretation following !the passage of the Revenue Collection

Bill, the alternative construction constitutes a threat to "the institutional order legitmated by the . . . ’offical’ definition of reality.When two competing universes cannot become integrated via continuing negotiation, the proponents of either.’universe,-¡may attempt to force the proponents of the other to act according to the dictates of their definition of reality. The Revenue Collection 108

Bill provided for the use of such force. It authorized the use of

military force against any State attempting to nullify Federal law.

The Southern political leaders derogated the bill by calling it

the Force Bill. Yet, the threat of force succeeded in gaining

the compliance of South Carolina, who at the time was the only

Southern State openly threatening defiance. Note that South

Carolina and the South in general did not endorse or accept the

consolidation theory but complied to avoid violence. Eventually

the South unified creating their own separate government constituted as a compact between the States. The objective realities thus created destroyed the institutional order dictated by the official universe of discourse and the resulting conflict was resolved by

force. The objective aspects of the "new" reality (the government, army, currency, flags) were destroyed and the offical reality re? established throughout the society.after a period aptly termed the Reconstruction.

A universe of discourse may be viewed as a system. As a system it is not entirely stable. Changes in any sector of the system may produce or facilitate change in other sectors. Moreover, changes which appear unrelated may be intimately related. Thus, the Protestant Reformation may have ramifications that are political and economic as well as religious. Thus,

In the first Protestant societies--England, Scan­ dinavia, the Netherlands, and later in the United States--perhaps even before the full development or a new motivational orientation, the central symbolic and political sphere, and the basic relations between the political and social spheres 109

were transformed through the incorporation of Pro­ testant values and symbols. This not only reinforced the existing autonomy of these spheres but created new bases of political obligations and more flexible political institutions,42

And presumably from this greater flexibility, modernization in

economic and industrial sectors was facilitated.

Reality reconstruction may occur as a result of the natural

symbolic activities of the human mind, in response to problems

or reality shbcks, and as the result of interaction between sectors

of the universe of discourse.

RHETORICAL VISION

Kenneth Burke suggests that "even in the ’best possible of worlds,’ the need for symbolic tinkering would continue." " This need occurs because of the inherent imperfection of the empirical manifestations of symbolic constructions, to the effects of historical progression, incident, or accident.

Though language and the prevailing universe of discourse tend to channel the thought processes within a society, it is possible to think thought new thoughts, to create new symbols, and through communication share these inventions. The "new" may be a reordering of the old. The "new" is not the normal. The vocabulary of any language provides opportunités for vocabulary relationships far beyond the relatively few combinations evident in the prevailing universe of discourse. New combinations provide new verbal equations for human .thought and action. Though language and the prevailing universe of discourse tend to constrain thought, they do not 110

preclude the creative acts of rhetorical vision. As Robert Kennedy expressed it "Some men see things as they are and ask why. I dream of things that never were and ask why not.”

SUMMARY

Universes of discourse provide the symbolic matrix for social action. It is the structure of social reality. Social reality maintains itself via socialization and primarily through the process of conversation which confirms the subjective reality of the individual and his internalized universe of discourse.

The boundaries of a universe of discourse are meaninglessness and confusion and the rejection of the universe leaves an individual without orientation and in mental stress. Thus, mere rejection is seldom a viable option to an individual or society.

Reality reconstruction occurs in response to symbolically conceived problems and reality shocks. They are made possible by the constructive powers of the human mind. They may be due to changes in one part of the universe of discourse interacting with and producing changes in other sectors. Rhetorical vision is a construction of a new social reality in linguistic terms.

Such a new reality lacks objective existence, but could be created. Ill

CHAPTER V ENDNOTES

■'•Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality. Garden City: Doubleday and Company 1966. p. 58.

2Herbert Blumer. Symbolic Interactionism. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall 1969, p. 16.

□ William I. Thomas. "The Definition of the Situation," in Symbolic Interaction. Edited by Jerome G. Manis and Bernard N. Meltzer. Boston: Allyn and Bacon 1967. p. 3.5

^Tamotsu Shibutani. "Reference Groups and Social Control," in Human Behavior and Social Processes. Edited by Arnold M. Rose. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 131.

^Alfred Schutz. On Phenomenology and Social Relations. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1970. pp. 120-121.

^Ralph H. Turner. "Role-Taking: Process versus Conformity," in Human Behavior and Social Processes. Edited by Arnold M. Rose. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 23.

^Robert F. Terwilliger. Meaning and Mind. New York: Oxford University Press 1968. p. 272.

O Jose Ortega Y Gasset. Man and Crises. Translated by Mildred Adams. New York: W. W. Norton and Company 1958. p. 50.

^Berger and Luckmann, pp. 39-40.

^Herman Zanstra. The Construction of Reality. New York: The Macmillan Company 1962. p. 14.

'•'•Ibid., p. 14.

12 Berger and Luckmann, p. 90.

1 3 Richard M. Weaver. The Ethics of Rhetoric. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company 1953. p. 211.

■'•^Kenneth Burke. A Grammar of Motives. Los Angeles: University of California Press 1969. p. 362. 112

3Burkhart Holzner. Reality Construction in Society. Cambridge: Schenkman Publishing Company 1968. p. 144.

■'■^Yehoshua Arieli. Individualism and Nationalism in American Ideology. Baltimore: Penguin Books 1966. p. 29.

17 Ibid., p. 22,

18 Don Martindale. Social Life and Cultural Change. New York: D. Van Nostrand 1962. p. 43.

19 Paul B. Horton and Chester L. Hunt. Sociology. New York: McGraw Hill 1964. p. 150.

20Ibid., p. 127.

21Ibid., p. 128.

2 2 ¿¿For a discussion of these processes see Horton and Hunt's Sociology, Chapters 5,6,7,8,10,13, and 14; Walter Buckley. Sociology and Modern Systems Theory. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall 1967, Chapter 6; or for a general discussion and further bibliography see T. B. Bottomore. Sociology: A Guide to Problems and Literature. New York: Random House 1972.

23 Berger and Luckmann, p. 137.

24 Ibid., p. 140.

23Georges Gusdorf. Speaking. Translated by Paul T. Brockelman. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1965. p. 39.

28Holzner, p. 43.

27 Jose Ortega Y Gasset, p. 86.

2 ft Holzner, p. 13.

29 Joseph B. Fabry. The Pursuit of Meaning. Boston: Beacon Press 1968; or Victor E. Frankel. Man's Search for Meaning. Boston: Beacon Press 1962.

30Berger and Luckmann, p. 98. 113

33Arnold M. Rose. Human Behavior and Social Processes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1962. p. 9.

32 Berger and Luckmann, p. 41.

33Holzner, p. 11.

34Ibid., pp. 11-12.

33Ibid., p. 13.

36Thomas S. Kuhn. The Structure of Scientific Revolution.. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1970. p. 92.

37Ibid., p. 52.

3®Charles M. Wiltse. John C. Calhoun. New York: The Bobbs Merrill Company 1949. p. 194.

O Q ^John C. Calhoun, in Great Debates in American History. Edited by Marion Mills Miller. New York: Current Literature Publishing Company 1913. p. 102.

4®Berger and Luckmann, p. 98.

43Ibid., p. 98.

42S. N. Eisenstadt. "Transformation of Social, Political and Cultural Orders in Modernization," in Comparative Perspectives on Social Change. Edited by S. N. Eisenstadt. New York: Little, Brown and Company 1968. pp. 275-276.

43 Kenneth Burke. Attitudes Toward History. Los Altos: Hermes Publications 1959. p. 179. 114

APPENDIX 115

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH

The implications of a philosophy of rhetoric as reality construction provide for a myriad of research possibilities. I will mention only three areas which I consider of major importance.

1. This dissertation provides a philosophy of rhetoric.

It does not provide a methodology for rhetorical criticism.

Thus, a major contribution would either (a) develop a

methodology based upon this perspective or (b) attempt

to synthesize a methodology which is congruent to this

perspective from existing methodologies.

2. This philosophy of rhetoric may be corroborated through

empirical research. One particularly viable area for

such empirical research would be the effects of symbolism

on the interpretation of human behavior. Thus, diffential

reactions to a silent film which depicts a man beating a

.■ child could be attributed to introductions which instruct

subjects to interpret the behavior as "father disciplines

son" or "stranger attacks child."

3. Finally insofar as there is a keenly felt division between

many scholars who view rhetoric and communication as

separate areas, research which explores the potential

of this philosophy to provide a basis for a conceptually

unified study of rhetoric and communication would aid

in the development of a integrated study of Speech Communication. 116

BIBLIOGRAPHY 117

Alexander, Hubert G. Meaning in Language. Glenview: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1969.

Allan, D. J. The Philosophy of Aristotle. New York: Oxford University Press, 1952.

Alston, William P. Philosophy of Language. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1964.

Arieli, Yehoshua. Individualism and Nationalism in American Ideology. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1966.

Aristotle. "De Anima" in The Basic Works of Aristotle. Edited by Richard McKeon. New York: Random House, 1941.

______. "De Interpretatione" in The Basic Works of Aristotle. Edited by Richard McKeon. New York: Random House, 1941.

______. The Poetics of Aristotle. Translated by Preston H. Epps. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1942.

______. The Rhetoric of Aristotle. Translated by Lane Cooper. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1932.

Auden, W. H. The New Republic. July 14, 1941.

Austin, J. L. How to do Things with Words Cambridge: Harvard Universtiy Press, 1962.

Baldwin, Charles S. Ancient Rhetoric and Poetic. Gloucester: Peter Smith, 1959.

______. Medieval Rhetoric and Poetic. Gloucester: Peter Smith, 1959.

Berg, David M. "Rhetoric, Reality and Mass Media," The Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 58, Number 3 (October 1972), pp. 255-263

Berger, Peter L. and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality. Garden City: Doubleday and Company, 1966.

Bertalanffy.,. Ludwig, von., "On the Definition of the Symbol" in Psychology and the Symbol. Edited by Jose.ph’-RskRoyce 1 ..New York: Random House, 1965.

Bitzer, Lloyd. "The Rhetorical Situation," 'Philosophy and Rhetoric Volume 1 (January 1968), pp. 1-14.

.______and Edwin Black. The Prospect of Rhetoric. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1971. 118

Black, Edwin. Rhetorical Criticism: A Study in Method. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1965.

Black, Max. The Labrinth of Language. New York: A Mentor Book, 1968.

Blumer, Herbert. Symbolic Interactionism. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1969.

Bois, J. Samuel. The Art of Awareness. Buboque: William C. Brown Company, 1973.

Bormann, Ernest G. "Fantasy and Rhetorical Vision: The Rhetorical Criticism of Social Reality." The Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 58, Number 4 (December 1972), pp 396-407.

______. "The Eagleton Affair: A Fantasy Theme Analysis." The Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 59, Number 2 (April 1973), pp. 142-159.

Bottomore, T. B. Sociology: A Guide to Problems and Literature. New York: Random House, 1972.

Boulding, Kenneth. The Image. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1968.

Brown, Roger. Words and Things. Glencoe: The Free Press, 1958.

Buckley, Walter. Sociology and Modern Systems Theory. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1967.

Burke, Kenneth. A Grammar of Motives. New York: Prentice Hall, 1945.

______. Permanence and Change. Lost Altos: Hermes Publishing Company, 1954.

______. Philosophy of Literary Form. New York: Vintage Press, 1957.

______. Attitudes Toward History. Los’ Altos: Hermes Publishing Company, 1959.

______Language as Symbolic Action. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1966.

______Counter statement. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968.

______. A Rhetoric of Motives. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.

______• The Rhetoric of Religion. Berkeley: Univeristy of California Press, 1970. 119

Campbell, Karlyn Kohrs. Critiques of Contemporary Rhetoric. Belmont: Wadswoth Publishing Company, 1970.

Cantril, Henry. "Perception and Interpersonal Relations,” in Current Perspectives in Social Psychology. Second Edition. Edited by Edwin P. Hollander and Raymond G. Hunt. New York: Oxford University Press,,19677

Carroll, John B. Language and Thought. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1964.

Cassirer, Ernst. An Essay on Man. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1944.

______. Language and Myth. Translated by Susanne K. Langer. New York: Dover Publications, 1946.

______. The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Translated by Ralph Mannheim. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955.

Castaneda, Carlos. A Separate Reality. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1971.

Chomsky, Noam. Language and Mind. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1972.

Clark, D. L. Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance. New York: Columbia University Press, 1922.

______. Rhetoric in Greco-Roman Education. New York: Columbia University Press, 1957.

Clarke, M. L. Rhetoric at Rome. London: Cohen and West, Limited, 1953.

Cohen, L. Johnathan. The Diversity of Meaning. New York: Herder and Herder, 1963.

Coppee, Henry. Elements of Rhetoric. Philadelphia: Butler and Company, 1860.

Corbett, Edward P. J. Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student. New York: Oxford University Press, 1965.

Cornman, James W. Metaphysics, Reference and Language. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1966.

Deetz, Stanley. "Words without Things: Toward a Social Phenomenology of Language." The Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 59, Number 1 (February 1973), pp. 40-51. 120

Demerath, D. J. Ill and Richard A. Peterson. System, Change and Conflict. New York: The Free Press, 1967.

Dixon, Peter. Rhetoric. London: Methuen and Company, 1971.

Duncan, Hugh Dalziel. Symbols and Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Durant, Will. The Stofy of Philosophy. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1963.

Durkheim, Emile. The Rules of Sociological Method. New York: The Free Press, 1938.

. ______. Selected Writings. Edited by Anthony Giddens. Cambridge: Canbridge University Press, 1972.

Eisenstadt, S. N. Comparative Perspectives on Social Change. Boston Little, Brown and Company, 1968.

Ellingsworth, Huber W. and Theodore Clevenger, Jr. Speech and Social Action. Englewoods Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1967.

Gardner, John W.. "Individuality, Committment and Meaning," in Current Perspectives in Social Psychology. Edited by Edwin P. Hollander and Raymond G. Hunt. New York: Oxford University Press, 1967.

Goffman, Erving. The Presentation of Self in Everday Life. Garden City: Doubleday and Company, 1959.

Behavior in Public Places. New York: The Free Press, 1966.

Interaction Ritual. Garden City: Doubleday and Company, 1967

Stigma. New York: Penguin Books, 1968.

Relations in Public: Microstudies of the Public Order. New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1971.

Golden,, James. L.. and Edward P, J. Corbett. The Rhetoric of Blair, Campbell and Whately. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968.

Goodenough, Ward H. Culture, Language and Society. Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1971.

Goodman, Paul. Speaking and Language: Defense of Poetry. New York: Vintage Books, 1971.

Gray, Giles Wildenson. "Some Teachers and the. Transition to Twentieth Century. Speech Education," in A History of Speech Education in America. Edited by Karl R. Wallace. New York: Appleton-Century- Crofts, 1954. 121

Gusdorf, Georges. Speaking. Translated by Paul T. Brockelman. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1965.

Hallowell, A. Irving. Culture and Experience. New York: Schocken Books, 1967.

Hamburg, Carl H. . Symbols and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer. Martinus Ni.jhoff, The Hague, 1956.

Harrell, Maila, John Waite Bowers and Jeffry P. Bacal. "Another Stab at "Meaning”: Concreteness, Iconicity, and Conventionality," Speech Monographs. Volume 40, Number 3 (August 1973), pp. 199-207.

Hayakawa, S. I. Language in Thought and Action. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1972.

Herriot, Peter. An Introduction to the Psychology of Language. London: Methuen and Company, Limited, 1970.

Hertzler, Joyce 0. A Sociology of Language. New York: Random House, 1965.

Hochmuth, Marie and Richard Murphy. "Rhetorical and Elocutionary Training in Nineteenth Century Colleges," in A History of Speech Education in America. Edited by Karl R. Wallace. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1954.

Hollander, Edwin P. and Raymond G. Hunt. Current Perspectives in Social Psychology. 2nd Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 1967.

Holzner, Burkhart. Reality Construction in Society. Cambridge: Schenkmann Publishing Company, 1968.

' Horton, Paul B. and Chester L. Hunt. Sociology. New York: McGraw Hill Book Company, 1964.

Howes, Raymond F. Historical Studies of Rhetoric and Rhetoricians. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1961.

Husserl, Edmund. Phenomenology and the Crises of Philosophy. Translated By Quentin Lauer. New York: Harper and Row, 1965.

Hyman, Stanley Edgar. The Armed Vision. New York: Vintage Books, 1955.

Ichheiser, Gustav. Appearances and Reality. San Francisco: Jossey- Bass, 1970.

Jenkins, James J. "Language and Thought" in Approaches to Thought. Edited by James Voss. Columbus: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1969. 122

Johanneson, Richard L. Contemporary Theories of Rhetoric: Selected Readings. New York: Harper and Row, 1971.

.. - Rennard Strickland and Ralph T. Eubanks. Language is Sermonic. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964.

Kaplan, Abraham. The Conduct of Inquiry. Scranton: Chandler Publishing Company, 1964.

Kelly, George A. A Theory of Personality: The Psychology of Personal Constructs. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1963.

Kennedy, George. The Art of Persuasion in Greece. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963.

______. The Art of Rhetoric in the Roman World. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972.

Korzybski, Alfred. Science and Sanity. Lakeville: The International Non-Aristotelian Library Publishing Company, 1954.

Kuhn, Thomas S. The Structure of Scientific Revolution. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1970.

Kwant, Remy C. Phenomenology of Social Existence. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1965.

Laird, Charlton. The Miracle of Language. Greenwich: Fawcett Publications, 1953.*'

Langer, Susanne K. Heeling and Form. New York: Charles Scribner’s Son, 1953.

______. Philosophy in a New Key. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1960.

______. Philosophical Sketches. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1962.

Laszlo, Ervin. The Relevance of General Systems Theory. New York: George Braziller, 1972.

Lee, Irving J. Language Habits in Human Affairs. New York: Harper an Row, 1941.

Lehrer, Adrianne and Keith. Theory of Meaning. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1970.

Lerner, Daniel. "Toward a Communication Theory of Modernization: A Set of Considerations," in Comparative Perspectives on Social Change. Edited by S. N. Eisenstadt. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1968. 123

Mackin, John H. Classical Rhetoric for Modern Discourse. New York: The Free Press.

Manis, Jerome G. and Bernard N. Meitzer. Symbolic Interaction. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1967.

Mannheim, Karl. Man and Society in an Age of Reconstruction. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1940.

Marrou, H. I. A History of Education in Antiquity. Translated by George Lamb. New York: A Mentor Book, 1964.

Martindale, Don. Social Life and Cultural Change. New York: D. Van Nostrand Company, 1962.

Maslow, Abraham.H. The Psychology of Science. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1966.

McKeon, Richard. The Basic Works of Aristotle New York Random House, 1941.

"Aristotle’s Conception of Language and the Arts of Language," Classical Philology. Volume XLI, Number 4 (October 1946), pp. 193-206.

______. "The Uses of Rhetoric in a Technological Age." in The Prospect of Rhetoric. Edited by Lloyd Bitzer and Edwin Black. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1971.

McLuhan, Marshall. Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. New York: McGraw Hill, 1965.

Mead, George Herbert. Mind, Self and Society. Edited by Charles W. Morris. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1934.

______. The Philosophy of the Act. Edited by Charles W. Morris. Chicago: Universityoo"f Chicago Press,s 1938.

______. The Social Psychology of George Herbert Mead. Edited by Anselm Strauss. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956

Meadows, Paul. The Many Faces of Change. Cambridge: Schenkman Publishing Company, 1971.

Miller, Marion Mills. Great Debates in American History. New York: Current Publishing Company, 1913.

Moles, Abraham. Information Theory and Esthetic Perception. Translated by Joël E. Cohen. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1966.

Monane, Joseph H. A Sociology of Human Systems. New York: Appleton- Century-Crofts, 1967. 124

Moscovici, Serge. The Psychosociology of Language. Chicago: Markham Publishing Company, 1972.

Moustakas, Clark. Creativity and Conformity. New York: D. Van No strand Company, 1967.,

Nesbit, Prank Ford. Language, Meaning and Reality. New York: Exposition Press, 1955.

Nichols, Marie Hochmuth. Rhetoric and Criticism. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1963.

Ogburn, William Fielding. Social Change. New York: B. W. Huebsch, 1922.

Ogden C. K. and I. A. Richards. The Meaning of Meaning. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1923.

Ohmann, Richard. "In Lieu of a New Rhetoric," in Contemporary Theories of Rhetoric. Edited by Richard L. Johannesson. New York: Harper and Row, 1971.

Oldfield, R. C. and J. C. Marshall. Language. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1968.

Ortega Y Gasset, Jose. History as a System. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1941.

______. Man and Crises. Translated by Mildred Adams. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1958.

Parkinson, G. H. R. The Theory of Meaning. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Parsons, Talcott. The Social System. New York: The Free Press, 1951.

Quintilian. Institution Oratoria. Translated by H.E. Butler. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969.

Richards, I. A. Principles of Literary Criticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Incorporated, 1925.

...... Practical Criticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Incorporated, 1929.

. The Philosophy of Rhetoric. New York: Oxford University Press, 1936.

______. Speculative Instruments. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Incorporated, 1955.

Robb,, Mary Margaret. Oral Interpretation of Literature in American Colleges and Universities. New York: Johnson Reprint Company, 1968. 125

Robinson, W. P. Language and Social Behavior. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1972.

Rose, Arnold M. Human Behavior and Social Processes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1962.

Rosenfield, Lawrence W. "An Autopsy of the Rhetorical Tradition," in The Prospect of Rhetoric. Edited by Lloyd Bitzer and Edwin Black. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1971.

Roszak, Theodore. The Making of Counter Culture. Garden City: Doubleday and Company, 1969.

Royce, Joseph R. Psychology and the Symbol. New York: Random House, 1965.

Sapir, Edward. Language. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1949.

Schutz, Alfred. On Phenomenology and Social Relations. Edited by Helmut R. Wagner. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970.

Scott, Robert L. and Bernard Brock. Methods of Rhetorical Criticism: A Twentieth Century Perspective. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.

Searle, John R. Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970.

Shibutani, Tamotsu. "Reference Groups and Social Control," in Human Behavior and Social Processes. Edited by Arnold M. Rose. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1962.

Smith, Alfred G. Communication and Culture. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966.

Smith, Donald K. "Origin and Development of Departments of Speech," in A History of Speech Education in America. Edited by Karl R. Wallace. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1954.

Soloman, Robert C. Phenomenology and Existentialism. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.

Stewart, John R. Rhetoricians of Language and Meaning: An Ordinary Language Critique. Unpublished P.hD. Dissertation. University of Southern California, 1970.

______. "Concepts of Language and Meaning: A Comparative Study." The Quarterly Journal of Speech. Volume 58, Number 2 (April 1972), pp. 123-133.

Terwilliger, Robert F. Meaning and Mind: A Study in the Psychology of Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. 126

Thayer, Lee. "Communication Systems," in The Relevance of General Systems Theory. Edited by Ervin Laszlo. New York: George Braziller, 1972.

Thonssen, Lester, A. Craig Baird and Waldo W. Braden. Speech Criticism. New York: The Ronald Press, 1970.

Turner, Ralph H. and Lewis M. Killian. Collective Behavior. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1957.

Van de Geer, John P. "Codability in Perception." in The Psycho­ sociology of Language. Edited by Serge Moscovici. Chicago: Markham Publishing Company, 1972.

Voss, James. Approaches to Thought. Columbus: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1969.

Wallace, Karl R. A History of Speech Education in America. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1954.

______. Understanding Discourse. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1970.

Warfel, Harry. Language--A Science of Human Behavior. Cleveland: Howard Allen, 1962.

Weaver, Richard M. Ideas Have Consequences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948.

The Ethics of Rhetoric. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1953.

Visions of Order. Baton .Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964.

Whorf, Benjamin Lee Language, Thought and Reality. Edited by John B. Carroll. New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1958.

Wiltse, Charles M. John C. Calhoun. New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1949.

Wimsatt, William K Jr. and Cleanth Brooks. Literary Criticism: A Short History New York: Vintage Books, 1957.

Winch, Peter. The Idea of a Social Science and its Relation to Philosophy. New York: Humanities Press, 1970.

Winterowd, W. Ross. Rhetoric A Synthesis. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968.

Zanstra, Herman. The Construction of Reality. New York: The MacMillan Company, 1962.