Rhetoricity

This episode of Rhetoricity features an interview with Victor Vitanza, the Jean-Francois Lyotard Chair at the European Graduate School and a Professor of English and Rhetoric at Clemson University. The interview was conducted at the 2014 Rhetoric Society of America conference in San Antonio, Texas, and originally published as part of the Zeugma podcast's 2014 summer interview series. Dr. Vitanza founded the Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design (RCID) program at Clemson, has written such books as Negation, Subjectivity, and the History of Rhetoric and Sexual Violence in Western Thought and Writing, and serves as editor of Pre/Text: A Journal of Rhetorical Theory. He's currently working on a film and companion book entitled The Returns of Philology: This Time, Anachronistics. In this interview, Vitanza discusses Kenneth Burke and Geoffrey Sirc, rhetorics and media old and new, and Immanuel Kant and Internet cats. There's also, I should promise and advise listeners, quite a bit of talk about scatology. Since this interview is a little longer than other Rhetoricity episodes, I've split it in two. You can find the second half, during which we turn our attention to cats, Sirc, and the RCID program, here. This episode cites the following sources: Kenneth Burke's "Rhetoric--Old and New" Diane Davis's Inessential Solidarity Jacques Derrida's "Mochlos; or, the Conflict of the Faculties" Immanuel Kant's "Conflict of the Faculties" George A. Kennedy's "A Hoot in the Dark" Avital Ronell's The Telephone Book: Technology, Schizophrenia, Electric Speech Geoffrey Sirc's "Writing Classroom as A&P Parking Lot" It also includes sound clips from Johann Sebastian Bach's "Italienisches Konzert, BWV 971, Movement 1," the Community episode "Biology 101," and "Who You Gonna Call?" All other music and sound clips are from GarageBand's loop library and the website freesound.org.

Collin Brooke, an associate professor of rhetoric and writing at Syracuse University and author of Lingua Fracta, dives into the fascinating relationship between entropy and irony in digital discourse. He discusses how these concepts shape narratives around pressing issues like climate change. Additionally, Brooke shares insights about the creation of a personalized email newsletter focused on rhetoric and reflects on the challenges of acknowledging childhood regrets. This engaging dialogue blends personal anecdotes with academic depth, making complex ideas accessible.

Laurence Rickels, the Sigmund Freud Professor of Psychoanalysis at the European Graduate School and expert in psychoanalysis and popular culture, dives into fascinating topics. He discusses his latest book about psychopathy and the empathy test, revealing how Cold War-era science fiction shapes our understanding of these concepts. The conversation explores the link between sci-fi and collective trauma, particularly post-Holocaust, while also highlighting the art of writing and wordplay in engaging narratives. Rickels encourages deeper connections through his innovative approaches to literature.

In this episode of Rhetoricity, I interview Dr. Jenny Rice, an associate professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies at the University of Kentucky. In addition to appearing on this podcast's episode on small talk, Dr. Rice has made extensive contributions to rhetorical studies: she’s the author of the book Distant Publics: Development Rhetoric and the Subject of Crisis as well as articles in the Quarterly Journal of Speech, Argumentation and Advocacy, College Composition and Communication, and Rhetoric Society Quarterly (RSQ, for short). She’ll also be co-chairing the 2016 Rhetoric Society of America conference in Atlanta, Georgia. In this episode, I talk with Dr. Rice about her current book project, which is tentatively titled Awful Archives. In February 2015, she presented part of that project at The University of Texas at Austin's Digital Writing and Research Lab. A video of that presentation, which was entitled "Archival Magnitude: Quantities of Evidence and Insights into Reality," is available here. We also discuss a forum she's organizing for RSQ, an anthology she's co-editing with UT's Casey Boyle, and her approach to social media. This and all other Rhetoricity episodes are also available on iTunes and Stitcher.

This episode features an interview with Dr. Sharon Crowley, an accomplished rhetoric scholar and winner of the Conference on College Composition and Communication's 2015 Exemplar Award. Dr. Crowley is the author of Composition in the University: Historical and Polemical Essays, Toward a Civil Discourse: Rhetoric and Fundamentalism, and coauthor of the rhetoric textbook Ancient Rhetorics for Contemporary Students. In this episode, special guest interviewer Kendall Gerdes talks with Crowley about the recent history of rhetoric as a discipline, her advice for rhetoric graduate students, and what she's been reading lately. They even take a moment to talk about their respective experiences playing the video game Skyrim in connection with Umberto Eco's essay "The Return of the Middle Ages." This and all other Rhetoricity episodes are also available on iTunes and Stitcher.  

Small talk: it's both part of the lifeblood and part of the awkwardness of academic conferences. "Is your hometown treating you well?" "How about this weather?" "When did you get in?" The questions and answers are almost predetermined. Pushing the boundaries of this chatter, one might say, is a rhetorical project, and so this episode features two rhetoric scholars doing just that. Nathaniel Rivers (St. Louis University) and Jenny Rice (University of Kentucky) try out an array of alternate small-talk topoi, from questions about crying to old-timey firefighters to blood. This and all other Rhetoricity episodes are also available on iTunes and Stitcher.

In this episode, I explore the concept from which this podcast derives its title and part of its inspiration: rhetoricity. In keeping with a spirit of weirdness, I pursue this by asking a few rhetoric scholars--Diane Davis, Will Burdette, Steven LeMieux--the following question: what isn't rhetoricity? This and all other Rhetoricity episodes are also available on iTunes and Stitcher.