University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Theses and Dissertations 2015 A Taste For Things: Sensory Rhetoric Beyond The Human Justine Beatrice Wells University of South Carolina Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd Part of the English Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Wells, J. B.(2015). A Taste For Things: Sensory Rhetoric Beyond The Human. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/3694 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you by Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. A TASTE FOR THINGS: SENSORY RHETORIC BEYOND THE HUMAN by Justine Beatrice Wells Bachelor of Science College of Charleston, 2001 Bachelor of Arts College of Charleston, 2001 Master of Science University of Wisconsin, 2002 Master of Arts University of Wisconsin, 2003 Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English College of Arts and Sciences University of South Carolina 2015 Accepted by: Byron Hawk, Major Professor Pat J. Gehrke, Major Professor John Muckelbauer, Committee Member Gina Ercolini, Committee Member Diane Davis, Committee Member Lacy Ford, Senior Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies © Copyright by Justine Beatrice Wells, 2015 All Rights Reserved. ii DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my parents, Richard Wells and Christie Charbonneau Wells, who infected me with their diverse passions for the arts, humanities, and sciences, and who were extraordinarily supportive in my stumbling journey to rhetoric as the site for bringing these together. And it is dedicated to my partner, Anthony Stagliano, who, incredibly, appeared next to me, and took that journey too, and changed me, and changed with me. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Like many in the field, I took the “scenic” route to rhetoric, and this project would not have been possible without the many people and institutions who helped support that path. For starting me out with an interdisciplinary interest in psychology and philosophy from my first semester in college, I am deeply indebted to my undergraduate advisors at the College of Charleston, Trisha Folds-Bennett and Shaun Nichols. For my graduate training in psycholinguistics, which greatly informed my understanding of sensation, connectionism, and cognitive science, I was extremely fortunate to work under the close, rigorous advising of Maryellen MacDonald, and owe much to the entire extended network of the Language and Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin. I am also immensely indebted to the philosophy department at the University of Wisconsin —the four years of graduate training I received there were absolutely crucial to the project I undertake here. In particular, for leading me to my current interest in food politics through study, teaching, and on-the-ground explorations of bioethics and environmental ethics, I am gratefully indebted to Rob Streiffer. For superb training in the history of philosophy and invaluable feedback on my writing, I thank Paula Gottlieb and Ivan Soll. Finally, deep thanks goes to Larry Shapiro for his teaching in philosophy of mind, his guidance on my master’s thesis, his sense of humor, and his incredible support as an advisor both before and long after my time in the department. iv For first tipping me off to rhetoric, I have my longtime best friend, Jon Myers, to thank. He suggested I explore the communication department at UW, where I discovered a graduate seminar stocked with the continental philosophy I was seeking to supplement my analytic training. The course, mysteriously titled “Invention,” was taught by one Erik Doxtader, to whom I am deeply grateful for introducing (and luring) me to the field, for acting as my first advisor in rhetoric . and then for relocating to the University of South Carolina, where I eventually followed, and received training in continental theory to my heart’s content. I loved USC’s English department from my first visit, and have felt extremely fortunate to be part of such a stimulating, supportive, and lively community, through the ups and downs alike. In formulating this project, I have been thrilled to be friends and colleagues with smart, fun, and involved graduate students in comp/rhet, literature, and creative writing. Among the literature faculty, I thank Kate Adams, Bob Brinkmeyer, Gretchen Woertendyke, and David Shields, who have been extremely supportive of my work as I have traveled across literature, food studies, and rhetoric. I also thank Tony Jarrells for invaluable feedback on the material here on Marx. In the comp/rhet program, I am greatly indebted to John Muckelbauer, who is a phenomenal reader (though not always an affirmative one) and who has been a powerful model for me as a writer, a thinker, and a person. Deep thanks goes to Pat Gehrke, for his many hours of close work with me and his exhilarating support as an advisor, a teacher, and a role model. I am also extremely grateful to Byron Hawk, who was my friend and advisor long before I asked, and, I hope, long after (and who is right about most things, even though I rarely listen). v Finally, I thank my committee—Byron Hawk, Pat Gehrke, John Muckelbauer, Gina Ercolini, and Diane Davis. This was simply a dream committee for this project, and they have offered me invaluable feedback as I move forward. This dissertation would not exist if it were not for the unflagging support, inspiration, and encouragement of my parents. I would not have enjoyed writing it as I did if it were not for my happy, purring deskmate, Bella. It would not be what it is without my partner, Anthony Stagliano, who has offered me extraordinary support, invigorating conversation, and daily laughter, and who has transformed my thinking tremendously. vi ABSTRACT Amidst rising agricultural pollution, poor conditions for livestock animals, and disparity between “high” and “low” food cultures, gustatory taste has entered contemporary public rhetoric as a significant modality of intervention. This dissertation considers the environmentalist and social potential of this public embrace of sensory rhetoric. To do so, I build a rhetorical theory of sensation through a sensory re-engagement of the rhetorical tradition. Scottish Enlightenment thinkers, I argue, embraced aesthetic taste as a site where rhetoric and ethics mingle, and yet in promoting its cultivation, they fell into elitism. The subsequent, Marxist discourse on sensory emancipation developed rhetoric’s sensory and taste-based connections to ethics, taking an historical rather than an individualist perspective. I evaluate to what extent this discourse overcame Enlightenment elitism, and forge connections between the Marxist tradition and the current call among new materialists such as Bruno Latour for an immanent, compositionist reworking of critique. My final two chapters examine how a theory and critical practice of sensory rhetoric is elaborated in contemporary activist efforts from the industrial food exposé to the slow food and farm to school movements. Contributing to work in rhetoric and politics, my project provides an account of rhetoric’s materiality that closely links processes of materialization and practices of sensation. Contributing to work in rhetoric and ethics, I demonstrate that the ethico-rhetorical capacity for response abides not in the individual subject alone, but among all participants in the evolving zone of sensory contact. To the extent that those sensory collectives can recognize and vii embrace their ambient, inventive, and ever-evolving character, they harbor the potential to break with the Enlightenment ideal of a standard of taste and its associated elitism. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION ....................................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................ iv ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................... vii CHAPTER 1 RHETORIC’S COOKERY ...............................................................................1 1.1 MATERIALISM AND IMMANENCE ...........................................................................8 1.2 NEW MATERIALIST RHETORIC ............................................................................14 1.3 TRADITIONAL MATERIALIST RHETORIC ..............................................................19 1.4 CHAPTER OUTLINE ..............................................................................................36 CHAPTER 2 THE “SAVOUR OF THINGS” .......................................................................41 2.1 POLITICS, AFFECT, AND RHETORIC......................................................................43 2.2 HUME’S ETHICS OF COMMUNICATION .................................................................48 2.3 AESTHETIC TASTE AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF RHETORICAL INVENTION .....56 2.4 AESTHETIC TASTE AND THE RHETORICITY OF ETHICS .........................................64 2.5 CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................68 CHAPTER 3 SENSORY POWER .......................................................................................79 3.1 AESTHETIC