OK, You Know the Jargon, We Get It...

Knowledge of "specialized language" can be useful, or.. well, not useful at all.

from the Dilbert website - strip for 9/8/2011 - http://dilbert.com/strips/

Jargon, or discourse specific vocabulary, can be help you pass into gated discourse communities in the same way a secret password can. For example, if you use words like "reify" and "discursive" and "panopticon" frequently and correctly, you may notice the atmosphere becomes warmer and friendlier at our gathering of post-(insert term of choice here) scholars. However, if you use the wrong term at the wrong time, or drop the wrong name - your shibboleth will identify you as an impostor and will chill the air around you until you slink away in to outer darkness.

What is true for a circle of post-x scholars also holds true for groups of NASCAR fans, Trekkies, Vegans, Democrats, Republicans, and Business Leaders. Being fluent in the vocabulary of your discourse community can open doors for you, establish your credibility, and ensure you a place at the table of discussion.

Outside these circles, however... please, in the name of all that is holy, DROP THE JARGON and communicate clearly with your listeners in mind!

Ethos for The Uber Wealthy

I recently attended a large conference where a number of very famous speakers were on the agenda. The conference was designed as a motivational event for area business people, community leaders, etc. Each of the speakers was known for some attribute or accomplishment. That is to say, each had a unique appeal of "ethos" to the audience.

(Annie Olson, in her webpage at LeTourneau University, describes Ethos as being "all about your credibility, reliability, and authority as a speaker or writer. Essentially, ethos is your reputation with your audience and the strategies you use to convince your audience that you should be believed or taken seriously.")

One of the speakers was Steve Forbes. I anticipated that his ethos might be questioned by some who saw him as just the son of a very rich father who left him a thriving financial empire. This concern had not escaped Mr. Forbes. He opened his talk with something like the following:
The best piece of advice I can give you regarding success is this: Choose rich and successful parents!

Forbes practiced wise rhetorics here - by acknowledging the perceived objection, and by dealing with it up front so he could move on with his speech.

Tim Berners-Lee on the Web Today

Tim Berners-Lee’s "Manifesto on the State of the Web" begins with this: "The world wide web went live, on my physical desktop in Geneva, Switzerland, in December 1990. It consisted of one Web site and one browser, which happened to be on the same computer."

OK, so I stole the title "Manifesto" from other reviewers. The piece at issue here is actually an article titled "Long Live the Web: A Call for Continued Open Standards and Neutrality," and ran in the recent issue of Scientific American.

But "Manifesto" sounds so much more dramatic, yes? And the issues raised in the article have very dramatic implications - though they are treated in a very measured and logical way by Berners-Lee. I find one of the most intriguing discussions is that of the balance of control and freedom. Simplistic, one-sided arguments are much more likely to generate passionate responses. But they are also much more likely to generate naive, short-sighted and generally useless responses. And, according to Berners-Lee, the issues are too important for such responses:

"The Web is critical not merely to the digital revolution but to our continued prosperity—and even our liberty. Like democracy itself, it needs defending..."

You can find the article here: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=long-live-the-web&page=5 - Enjoy!

Recursive Pizza?

My daughter sent me the link below, commenting on how often she finds stuff from "my world," that is to say, the world of rhetorical theory. Many of my colleagues would probably respond that such discoveries should be expected because "Everything is rhetorical!" And indeed, I am likely to agree with them. When my friends and I converse using only quoted lines from Seinfeld, Shakespeare or The Andy Griffith Show, I am quite aware of the rhetorical and cultural framing, self-identifying discourse communities, and terministic screens at work in our chit-chat.

But whudathunk Pizza as a ontological examination and revelation of social construction and community? well, This guy (John Riepenhoff), that's who. Enjoy the rhetorical cheesy goodness of this unusual blog entry...

 

Adam Kuban's Article from the SLICE Blog

Preston Tucker (and Marshall McLuhan)

Tucker
Originally uploaded by RandyNickatNite

The Tucker! and what is that inscription above the car? Marshall McLuhan? You don't say. "The car has become an article of dress without which we feel uncertain, unclad, and incomplete." The techne of the car culture is integral to an understanding of the fabric of the general culture of "Americans."

Check out the "Tucker Club of America" here: http://www.tuckerclub.org/

The Rhetorical consideration of Setting (According to John Stewart)

If indeed, rhetoric is anything like "finding the available means of persuasion in a given situation," (and let's assume, for the sake of argument, that it is something like that,) then some things are both obvious and important:

• know who you are talking to (audience)
• know the situation and setting of your communication (kairos)
• know the network of cultural & communicative exchange of your audience (language)

It is sometimes easier to see how important these considerations are when they are done wrong, than it is to see when they are done right. For example, suppose you were to speak to a group of 11-year-old school kids - would you communicate the same as if you were speaking to a group of university faculty? No? I didn't think so.

You'd think this would be obvious. You'd be wrong.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Obama Speaks to a Sixth-Grade Classroom
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Vancouverage 2010

You know how much 6th graders love to meet bureaucratic heads of various government departments....

A couple of "rules of thumb" for rhetorically sound communication:
1) Don't bring a knife to a gun fight.
2)Don't bring teleprompters to a middle school classroom.

The Rhetorical Consideration of Audience (According to Twain)

Audience: A key component of Rhetorical Compostion, Literary Analysis, Usability Testing, Experience Design...

I offer here a little advice on making the most rheotrical hash of this substance. But it is not my advice - no, it is advice from the "great one' himself - Mr. Samuel Clemens. So, enjoy Mark Twain's take on the proer consideration of "audience."

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Whenever I am about to publish a book, I feel an impatient desire to know what kind of a book it is. Of course I can find this out only by waiting until the critics shall have printed their reviews. I do know, beforehand, what the verdict of the general public will be, because I have a sure and simple method of ascertaining that. Which is this—if you care to know. I always read the manuscript to a private group of friends, composed as follows:
1. Man and woman with no sense of humor.
2. Man and woman with medium sense of humor.
3. Man and woman with prodigious sense of humor.
4. An intensely practical person.
5. A sentimental person.
6. Person who must have a moral in, and a purpose.
7. Hypercritical person—natural flaw-picker and fault-finder.
8. Enthusiast—person who enjoys anything and everything, almost.
9. Person who watches the others, and applauds or condemns with the majority.
10. Half a dozen bright young girls and boys, unclassified.
11. Person who relishes slang and familiar flippancy.
12. Person who detests them.
13. Person of evenly-balanced judicial mind.
14. Man who always goes to sleep.
 

These people accurately represent the general public. Their verdict is the sure forecast of the verdict of the general public. There is not a person among them whose opinion is not valuable to me; but the man whom I most depend upon—the man whom I watch with the deepest solicitude—the man who does most toward deciding me as to whether I shall publish the book or burn it, is the man who always goes to sleep. If he drops off within fifteen minutes, I burn the book; if he keeps awake three-quarters of an hour, I publish—and I publish with the greatest confidence, too. For the intent of my works is to entertain; and by making this man comfortable on a sofa and timing him, I can tell within a shade or two what degree of success I am going to achieve. His verdict has burned several books for me—five, to be accurate.
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Excerpted from "Who is Mark Twain" by Mark Twain, which can be found at http://www.dailylit.com/books/who-is-mark-twain