Everyone will be required to make a 15-20 minute presentation on a selected topic related to biographical, historical, or other topical points. The presentation should provide your colleagues in the class with key contextual information that will enrich our understanding of the rhetorical theories we are reading. The presenter shall provide a handout and a useful annotated bibliography on the day of the presentation. I will ask for an electronic copy of your annotated bibliographies to include on this website.
A goal of all graduate study is to enter into the discourse and practices of the field. Academics produce volumes of critical material discussing the ideas central to the field. We rely on each other’s reviews and syntheses of materials to identify important texts and scholarly articles to enrich our own understanding of primary texts. In class, we will be discussing the primary texts that shape the classical tradition of rhetoric. For this assignment, you will select a scholarly book or set of scholarly articles on a topic and write a review essay of them. Ideally, you will target your essay for a journal submission.
(coming soon: List of Journals in the Field; Selected Bibliographies)
Due: November 6 (was due on 10/30, but we moved it up a week!)
Ultimately, you will write a paper that contributes to the critical understanding of classical rhetorical theory that will argue for an interpretation of that theory, critique the implications of that theory, or argue for the ways the theory applies to contemporary contexts (such as in the teaching of writing or in understanding contemporary discourse). Ideally, you will target this paper for a related journal or conference for publication/presentation.
Draft Due: November 20th; Final draft due last day of class
August 28, 2007