Action, Reaction, and Contemplation: What is Action?

Several of the authors we read this past week discussed the ways we read, perceive, act upon, and write about our world and ideas through cognitive, expressionistic, and social-epistemic rhetorics. Kenneth Burke, a social-epistemic rhetorician, might ask us to contemplate Wikipedia entries for their social implications.

Andrew began his presentation by asking "What is Wikipedia?" Although the writers of Wikipedia may try (or not) to present unbiased entries, Wikipedia articles are written by people with a biased perspective. Wikipedia entries are slices of history written by people with unique perspectives at a certain time and place in history. Written by someone else with an agenda, a different belief system, or of a different gender or political affiliation, an article might have a completely different slant. The writing of history is similar. Centuries ago, David Hume understood that history was not static, and he knew history could be rewritten. To revisit the "The Cambridge Companion to Hume," Hume learned that recorded history was also incorrect when he studied ancient civilizations and found that ancient scribes could not have portrayed an accurate representation of society (288). Does Wikipedia portray an accurate representation of society? Does Wikipedia present accurate facts? These questions and the answers to them may depend on how a "symbol-wise" person interprets them.

Jessica Enoch, in "Becoming Symbol-Wise: Kenneth Burke's Pedagogy of Critical Reflection," shares with us Kenneth Burke's beliefs: "Man literally is a symbol-using animal. He really does approach the world symbol-wise and symbol-foolish" (272). Burke believes, "Beginning absolutely, we might define man as the typically language-using, or symbol-using, animal" (279). For Burke, the way for people to make sense of their world is to understand the relationship of language (symbols) in the world. An exercise Burke's students used was to revise the news. Enoch discusses the strategy: "This exercise exposes students to the idea that seemingly 'factual' news stories always produce a pronounced attitude for or against certain positions" (284). Burke's intention is that students examine the language used in news stories, consider different ways stories can be presented, and imagine what might be missing from a story. By examining the terms (symbols) writers use, Burke's exercise introduces students to the idea of "terministic screens." News stories and perhaps all "factual" writing, are what Burke considers a "reflection of reality," and a "selection" and "deflection" of reality. As is evidenced in Wikipedia, in all news stories, and in the writing of history, elements are missing, and authors are biased. Burke's call to us, too, is to critically reflect linguistic symbols and attain an "attitude that necessitates waiting, listening, reflecting, and analyzing before any arguments are made or action is taken" (292).

Burke's rhetoric, as James Berlin expresses, resides within the Social-Epistemic Rhetoric as we read in "Rhetoric and Ideology in the Writing Class" in the Norton anthology. But as Berlin notes, "There are as many conflicts among the members of the group as there are harmonies" (678). Berlin discusses one approach to the "explicit critiques of economic, political, and social arrangements" found in Ira Shor's methods. Shor posits that in order for students to attain power in their lives, they must understand what society has denied them. Shor's students learn how they are "denied opportunities" because of social order in which "they become convinced that change is impossible" (680). The change in social construct begins in the classroom. In Shor's classrooms, students and teachers vary from the traditional approach where teachers are the authoritarians and students are the receptacles of teacher-directed knowledge. Students are equal partners in their education, and together students and teachers select materials and form content of this "liberatory classroom." Students then learn how to use their "awareness of these [social] forces," counter those forces and become agents of social change. Where Burke would have students reflect and question, Shor would see students change "from re-active objects into society-making subjects" (681).

Regardless of the ideological camp in which our rhetorical pedagogy resides, whether it be cognitive, expressionistic, or social-epistemic, we are called to act. If that action or reaction is to be contemplative reflection or if it is to be a physical action in body, voice, or writing, is another matter. What action should not be is to sit idly by and passively accept that anything we read on the internet, or read or hear in the news is the truth. We must question, and if need be, act.

How writers write and learners learn

"Over time and cultures, the most robust and most effective form of communication is the creation of a powerful narrative." ~ Howard Gardner in Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Changing Our Own and Other People's Minds.
Before class began Tuesday evening, three references were made to a well-documented but debated phenomenon: a natural inclination toward linguistics but not math. As a mathematically-challenged person, I can attest to the fact that I have greater linguistic abilities than I do in logical-mathematical reasoning. It is a debatable issue because educators can limit their teaching if they teach only to math or linguistic intelligences (because they are the most common) without addressing other intelligences. According to Howard Gardner's multiple intelligences (MI) theory, all students can learn content if they learn through MI applications. Emily's presentation brought back memories about Gardner's theory and my undergraduate teacher education program. In education courses, students learn how to apply the intelligences within their pedagogies. Incorporating all of the intelligences is not easily done in the real world of teaching, but after thinking about MI again, I see new ways to use the intelligences as a means of invention in composition. The intelligences are about how we learn, and they easily lend themselves to process writing. The possibilities for reaching reticent writers through MI is an exciting prospect as well.

When exploring the ways writers write, Samuel Coleridge's compositions may be examined for how they vary from the standard English style of writing. Most of us who are native English speakers, think, speak, and write linearly. We scaffold our discourse, building fact upon fact. Many people from other countries do not think, speak, and write linearly. Some cultures compose their discourse with a more spiral construction; many ideas are explored, and they diverge far off topic before arriving at the main point. Coleridge wrote in such a way. Rex Veeder, in "Coleridge's Philosophy of Composition: An Overview of a Romantic Rhetorician," writes about Coleridge's philosophy: "There must be willingness, then, on the composer's part to accept obscurity as a vital ingredient of the composing process. Working through obscure thoughts in acts of composition assists us in creating an innovative personality" (22). While it is true that Coleridge was creative, his innovativeness made him difficult to read. Veeder shares with us Linda Flower's thoughts about Coleridge: "Coleridge's 'inspirational' model for composition is a threat to the teaching of composition," and Ross Winterowd's assertion that Coleridge's "theory of composition or rhetoric lacks purpose" (20). The problems of Coleridge's composition lie in the fact that his "method for composition is defined by a circular rather than linear approach to the structure of an essay" (26). For teachers of English composition, such writing presents problems with the way we view organization.

Coleridge wrote in a way that Ann E. Berthoff describes in "Learning the Uses of Chaos" in our Norton anthology: "Meanings do not come out of the air; we make them out of a chaos of images, half-truths, remembrances, syntactic fragments, from the mysterious and unformed" (648). Berthoff asserts that we must look beyond linear composing when she writes, "Learning to write means learning to tolerate ambiguity, to learn that the making of meaning is a dialectical process determined by perspective and context" (649). This is a lesson for those who teach composition. Our students' diversity in thinking and writing means that they do not all write linearly, and we educators must make "dialogue out of chaos" in order to reach others and form communities with our students.

Amy began her enjoyable and informative presentation with a quote from Mary Astell: "The way to be a good orator is to be a good Christian." Astell was a forerunner of feminist ideals, although at the time she likely would have believed that feminism was unChristian-like, but she did not know the possibilities before her. Times were changing, and women were making advancements - and as Dr. Souder suggested, women were making "baby steps" toward equality, but in Astell's day, women were still subjective to ancient biblical beliefs which held that women should not speak in certain realms. And it was not only biblical tenets, but women were also subjected to heavily dominated male-shared beliefs to which Aristotle addressed when he said, "silence is a woman's glory." These attitudes kept women in the home and out of the public eye. It was for those reasons that Astell did not consider the possibilities of women becoming ministers and lawyers. She did, however, know that women had a voice they were not using and minds they were not developing.


We need a dash, no, we need a barrage of Mary Astell's encouragement today. More women than ever have entered our colleges and universities, and in fact, outnumber men in most higher institutions; however, some women's issues have worsened. After decreasing for a number of years, violence toward women is rising, and increasing numbers of women short themselves when they choose teen motherhood and do not consider the possibilities of our world. (These issues could be promoted as timely composition topics in our schools). Astell promoted that it was women's responsibility to improve their minds and to contribute to the education of their daughters. In some ways, we have taken steps backward in the education of many of our daughters. And while Astell was speaking of "fashionable ladies," in A Serious Proposal to the Ladies, she wrote, "Why won't you begin to think, and no longer dream away your lives in a wretched incogitancy?" and "Can you dote on a mean, ignorant and ignoble life?" Astell was frustrated with women not using using their God-given reason when she wrote those words, and she would be frustrated with women today.

Technology is a realm in which we realize possibilities, but there seem to be divergent paths on the information highway for women and men. In "Feminist Research in Computers and Composition" from Computers in the Composition Classroom, Lisa Gerrard discusses the possibilities of computer technology. She wrote the article in 1999, and some references are a bit dated, (technology writing is outdated the day after it is written, is it not?) but she addresses issues that continue to be problems today. While women are technologically literate, the ways women use computers and technology are different from the ways men use technology. Gerrard asked this question: "...does the computer-based writing class, which publicizes an individual's writing in many ways, affect men and women differently?" (196). What is the answer to her question these eleven years later? Our blogging is now not only for our peers, but it is available for all the world to see. That much public writing, especially when one is a novice and not well-versed in a mode of writing, is disconcerting.

Gerrard relates several examples of gender differences in computer usage. One is about games. She writes, "Games matter because they are teaching a whole generation of children about computers. If girls don't play games, they may come into our classrooms with little prior computer experience" (189). The world of gaming hasn't changed much in eleven years in that most games are still made for males. Women have, however, embraced computer technology. Does gaming promote more skills than than the ways women use technology? While women's usage might be different, girls and women have more computer skills than they did only a few years ago when they entered school. We are progressing as long as we continue to use our brains and consider the possibilities before us.