A Comparison

Throughout the three essays in ISMLL the one thing that stuck out to was the constant posing of questions. Jarrat offers several definitions rhetoric. "[R]hetoric concerns itself with the ways human beings use speech to influence one another's attitudes and behavior" (74); "Here is a utopian vision of rhetoric: a political practice enabling free and open exchange of views by competent and authorized speakers for efficacious collective action" (74); "rhetoric's typical scene-a single person addressing an audience of quiet listeners" (74); "The speech itself is, both its oral performance and its written version is referred to as rhetoric, a composition crafted to fit a particular situation" (76). These varied definitions or meanings are linked together by the fact that they all describe rhetoric as a type of speech act. Speech acts, according to Austin's theory (as we have discussed and as I have understood in my Discourse Analysis class) is how we do things with utterances (Parastou's definition). Utterances, which do not necessarily have to be complete sentences, perform the task of changing the way of the world by following a set of rules. Rhetoric does this very thing. Rhetoric uses language to persuade or dissuade or change or in some instances maintain the status quo. I agree with Jarrat that understanding the "violent potential of language...[but also having] a sense that language can help us contain or master violent forces" (Jarrat 75), is necessary. She mentions the fact that new voices are emerging in the field of rhetoric, women and people of color; if these writers also view language in the same manner then we will continue to have the change that Bartholomae writes about when it comes to teaching composition. The rhetoric in composition teaching will ultimately change and there will be a more elevated (for lack of a better word) perception of what composition actually is and what comp teachers actually do. With this rhetoric change perhaps will come the answers to the questions that Bartholomae poses at the end of his essay, "What is a good student paper?What genres of writing are appropriate for the college classroom? Can we establish a corpus of student writing for common reference? Are there emerging or possible genres that we have not yet given appropriate attention? What are best practices for courses with varied goals and in varied settings?" (120).