barcelona meets pullman

Bizzell's Rationality as Rhetorical Strategy

“The more we understand situations like this [the Barcelona disputation], the more we should be cautioned against teaching argument in a simplistic pro-con sort of way” (146).

I recently asked my 101 students to try an exercise where they were to find two articles that covered the same (or a similar) social issue, but from different angles. When it was time to dissect the arguments at hand, the students seem frustrated as hell that 1) they couldn’t separate the two writers’ claims into a tidy list of pro versus con, and 2) the writers appeared to be contradicting themselves within their own texts. When I asked them, “What do you think that says, then, about argumentation itself?” one student responded, “That it’s way more complicated than rational rights and wrongs!” The rational, cautions Bizzell, certainly does have its limits.

From a religious debate in 13th century Spain to the composition classrooms of today’s U.S. universities, Bizzell moves with ease and grace as she draws connections to, and promotes the modeling of, hybrid discourses and rhetorical complexities. Her advice to me, as a new college writing instructor, is a breath of fresh -- and incredibly relevant -- air. I was hoping we would land on an article that specifically addressed 101 methodology by offering an “escape route” from the binary argumentation trap, and… Voila! Bizzell delivers in style.

Her most poignant assertion, I believe, is that the materials we need to begin teaching things like mixed discourses and rhetorical complexities are already at our fingertips. Referring to Nahmanides and Charles Langston as models, Bizzell says, “resourceful rhetoricians make use of the materials at hand, however flawed, to do something, however limited, on behalf of their causes” (146). Thank goodness. That gives me hope in the possibility of translating theory into practice because of its mere suggestion that the smallest victories are not to be overlooked.

What do I mean? When we (and by that I mostly mean I) consider a concept like social justice, we have a tendency to think in a polarized, sweeping, win/lose sort of way. If the “side” with less power falls short of accomplishing a full-blown social revolution, we tend to hang our heads and call it defeat. It’s hopeless. The Man wins again. But if we reprogram ourselves to notice the glimpses of change in human power dynamics as we saw in the Barcelona disputation, for example, we can be much more encouraged that some feathers are being ruffled, some balance is shifting, and cultural mixing is already brewing in our midst.

While Nahmanides’ rhetorical boldness may not have won justice for all Jews, it certainly started the process of prying open the gates of cross-cultural dialogue. As oppressive and unmoving as the Christians were, their spokesman (King James) still praised Nahmanides for his savvy rhetorical skills. He said, “I have never seen a man who is not right argue his case so well” (145). But if the case had never been argued in the first place, it wouldn’t have received such praise. Granted, KJ’s statement surely packs a harsh punch by claiming that Nahmanides is ultimately wrong, but it still shows a newfound realization within the King that despite ultimate discord in ideologies, the Jews can play as equals in the intellectual exchange game. A small victory, of course, but still worthy of celebrating. Or, as Bizzell says of Nahmanides’ success: “Limited, yes, but quite remarkable under the circumstances” (146). I might even use this in 101.

Romano's Tlaltelolco: The Grammatical-Rhetorical Indios of Colonial Mexico

“Tlaltelolco was a composition-rhetoric site designed for those perceived as needing instruction in the dominant culture’s uses of language” (118). My first thought: Sounds an awful lot like U.S. academia!

Overall, Romano’s piece offered me an historical “case study,” of sorts, that exposed blatant links between power relations and education. Most disturbing to me was the “create and control” mindset that so obviously steered the Friars’ leadership. Not only did an aggressive push for Christian doctrine drive the schooling system, but so did a condescending, fear-based misrepresentation that worked to maintain the existing hegemonic structure. When the Dominicans realized that they were empowering the very group they intended to subjugate, they pulled a 180, as if to say, “Oh shit, they’re gaining on us! Quick, call them monkeys, parrots and magpies, and claim that they’re full of vice!” In other words, “We are the appropriators in the house. Don’t you dare let them steal our authority.” I love that Romano refers to the basis of this behavior as “class anxieties” (123) because I think that’s exactly what’s behind the modern-day resistance to code-meshing and inviting home languages into U.S. classrooms. Just demonize the immigrant students and we’ll retain our power-seat. Juan Baptista’s influence of (mis)representing people in the image that best suits the colonizer’s needs is, tragically, still among us. Just open the newspaper: Our president’s stance on the U.S.-Mexico border dispute says it all. Something tells me Bush and the Dominican friars would’ve formed a pretty solid Old Boys’ Club.

Mao's Rhetorical Borderlands

(Warning: stream of consciousness writing style ahead)

“Indirectness and directness, like ‘yin’ and ‘yang,’ are never not fluid and fluctuating, and the value of one is always parasitic upon that of the other, and vice versa” (175).

We’re again being called to check ourselves when it comes to western tendencies toward polarized thinking… as we should be… the obsessive need to define things and people in terms of difference, otherness, you over there vs. us over here… The ethnographer gone wrong… the scholar and the subject… Does he like coffee? Isn’t he Chinese? Wow, I didn’t know the Chinese liked coffee! We insist on the “this-ness” versus “that-ness” when often, as Mao asserts, reality resides in the both/and “entangled encounters,” the yi moments that reveal subtle cultural fusions, enriching rhetorical encounters, complications, and discoveries… “the third space” that allows an opening of eyes and minds and rules of language and borders… the lava lamp, the fortune cookie, the Nez Perce student’s rap video. Am I romanticizing the togetherness-in-difference concept? It doesn’t feel that way to me, but then again, I’m just one little human graduate student with social filters, imperfect constructions, and subjective truths of my own that inevitably are seeping out onto this very page… Right? (I'm trying t segue into Holliday, can you tell?)

Quick note on the Holliday crew:

The authors kept referring to Stuart Hall’s work in mass media analysis stereotyping, yet they didn't provide a very expansive picture of Hall’s writing. Maybe a little snippet was all they intended to give us, and I'll just look up his work on my own time, but I do think it would've strengthened their assertions (on 125) to offer more context. That's my biggest challenge with this book (and with most general ed, all-encompassing text books) - that it tries to cover everything under the sun about cross-cultural language exchange within 200 pages. I'd rather go in-depth on one, or a few, aspects than attempt to "know it all."