Classical Rhetoric

Here are some notes I took from the Rhetoric class I am taking this year. I think this is extremely relevant to the kind of work we are doing in this class and to life in general.

Aristotle On Rhetoric:


Dialectic – Logic through conversation; coming to a conclusion through the conversation of 2 or more people.

All men use logic and rhetoric.
Because of this, you can use logic and rhetoric randomly or you can practice it and learn to use it with effectiveness.

Art – methodical treatment of a subject.

Real art requires discipline. Romanticism has made almost the entire modern world think that art is only a form of intuition and emotion. But art starts with thought, and emotion compliments it. It takes both, but thought is the most important aspect of art.

Uses of Rhetoric:

1) Linguistic Windex: Rhetoric gets the junk out of the way so that truth and justice prevail. Truth and justice do the work, rhetoric just gets the junk out of the way by using logic, arguments, etc: things that already exist. Being a bad speaker, for example, gets in the way of advancing truth and justice. Rhetoric fixes that.
2) Rhetoric allows a speaker to communicate to the whole man, not just the brain or the emotions. It is the bridge between the speaker and the audience. Rhetoric takes all of the human factors into consideration in order to persuade them effectively.
3) Rhetoric allows a speaker to see both sides of the argument so that a speaker can fully understand an opponent in order to defeat them. When you know how the opponent thinks and argues, you can know how to defeat them.
4) Rhetoric allows you to defend yourself and, more importantly, the truth. It is a tool of self-defense; verbal martial arts. Rhetoric defends the truth.

(The above is true under the assumption that the speaker using rhetoric is ethical.)

The purpose of rhetoric is not necessarily to persuade, but to come as close as possible to doing that as the situation will allow.

Why does Aristotle say that rhetoric is NOT the art of persuasion? Because if you do not persuade, you will have thought that you have failed, and might be tempted to use unethical means to persuade next time. It is the same in the medical field. It does not necessarily mean that a doctor has failed if a patient has died. Some patients are beyond help, and he can make them comfortable and peaceful as they die, but might not be able to save them. This is not his fault. Rhetoric, it seems, is a lot like evangelism. Converting pagans is not the goal of evangelism. The Holy Spirit, in the end, renews the mind and soul of the non-believer. The evangelizer just plants the seed of truth, which might directly lead to a conversion, but not necessarily.

The Final Definition: Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.