Rhetorical Dimensions Of Popular Culture

Abstract

The main argument of this book is that most rhetorical theory defines rhetoric as its manifestations - speeches, essays, poems and so forth. It proposes that rhetoric be regarded as the social function that manages meaning - a function with many complex manifestations. The author develops a theoretical scheme to explain this concept and details principles for critical and pedagogical application of his theory. In the second part of the book, the author applies theory and critical principles to the complex and fragmented texts of popular culture - television programmes, science fiction, horror films, popular periodicals and novels - and to the arena of urban race relations. Social observers have expressed concern over fragmentation and decline in public communication and popular culture. A theoretical difficulty that accompanies these social concerns is that rhetoric has been and continues to be considered largely a verbal, discursive art. Traditional methods for understanding rhetoric are inadequate for understanding nondiscursive rhetoric. In short, we do not understand how people influence each other and are influenced by others in the environment of fragmentary signs, both verbal and nonverbal, that is popular culture today. In this volume Brummett asks scholars to approach rhetoric first in terms of what it does - its functions - rather than in terms of what it is - its manifestations - thus urging a re-examination of rhetorical theory and a re-ordering of issues in the field. He surveys and integrates the literature of several scholarly disciplines. Rhetoric is a relatively recent category in contemporary scholarship, cutting across several disciplines. This volume turns that broad movement of scholarship from a limited view of verbal texts into a more widely useful understanding of how popular culture influences and is influenced by the public.

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