Woolf and Women in Shorts

Virginia Woolf once said “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” (1250). When looking at the history of women in rhetoric (as I have been doing the last few weeks), women were not even allowed to have money or a room of their own until pretty recently. In the medieval and early renaissance, it was very difficult for women successfully continue their scholarship after marriage unless their husband died. Marriage was usually a forcible obligation women were under from their families because they had no legal right to money or property. Modesta Fonte, an Italian humanist writer, in her book The Worth of Women, discusses how marriage meant the end of freedom since upper class women of this period were required to be sequestered in the home after marriage, and they were rarely allowed to even leave the house except on special occasions. This is the same way women were treated in Athenian society some 1000 years earlier. It appears that, for many women throughout the centuries, “Husbands and hard times are never long in arriving” as Fonte puts it (48).

The Rhetorical Tradition points out that the majority of rhetoric “produced before the modern period comprised arguments for allowing women to express themselves at all in speech or writing, ore especially to practice rhetoric in public forums” (1200). Virginia Woolf is significant because she is one of the first women rhetoricians that was advancing the genre of rhetoric with female viewpoints, rather than only arguing for women’s value in the first place. While Woolf does argue for women’s value, as all female rhetoricians seemed to have to do, she also discusses the unique quality that women writers add to the world of thought. She points out the shallow quality of female characters in most fiction written by men. “Suppose for instance that men were only represented in literature as the lovers of women, and were never the friends of men, soldiers, thinkers, dreamers” (1264). This rhetorical technique of comparing a typical social situation for a women and then placing a man in the same role is still in effective use by man feminists today.

 (It would seem strange to tell men not to wear shorts when it is hot outside, but women get slut-shammed for this all the time.) 

Another excellent point Woolf made is how fictional women characters interact with each other in things written by men verses women. “Cleopatra’s only feeling about Octavia is one of jealousey…but how interesting it would have been if the relationship between the two women had been more complicated” (1264).

This reminded me of the Bechdel Test, which is “sometimes called the Mo Movie Measure or Bechdel Rule. [it is] a simple test which names the following three criteria: (1) it has to have at least two women in it, who (2) who talk to each other, about (3) something besides a man. The test was popularized by Alison Bechdel's comic Dykes to Watch Out For, in a 1985 strip called The Rule.” This is according to the website https://bechdeltest.com/

(This is a screen shot from the website with recently added movies that have passed and failed the test )


 Clearly, this issue with women's representation in fiction has not ended, it has only expanded to the sphere of motion pictures. 

Burke and Dierrida – I should have posted this last week, but I was infected by a horrible plague

The Rhetorical Tradition explains that much of Kenneth Burke’s work over more than 50 years “has been to attempt to redefine and expand the scope of rhetorical analysis to apply it to all forms of language use” (1295). This is the understanding I currently have of the purpose of modern rhetoric and it is interesting to find out where this idea began in modern times and how it took 2500 years to get there. Burke says that motives consist of Act (what took place), Scene (when or where it was done, setting/background), Agent (who did it), Agency (what means ), and Purpose (why). Whether people make it known or not everything has a motive “poetry and fiction, in political and scientific works, in news and bits of gossip offered at random” (1298). I really like how Burke described this and it really makes sense toward the foundation of rhetoric today. I have always subscribed to this view myself, before knowing that Burke had these ideas, expect my version is to ask: “Who’s paying for it?”  Because, generally speaking, you can quickly discern the motive of someone’s rhetoric by who writes their paycheck. This is how rhetoric can apply to every discipline, by looking at the underlying structure of how a discipline writes it rhetoric and why. Clearly, Berlin and many others have expanded on Burke’s ideas into the modern form of rhetorical analysis. I also like how Burke declares that literature is not exempt from the study of its motivation, thus it is not exempt from rhetoric as many have tried to claim.

  

Derrida is also an interesting character that I have heard a lot about, but have not really studied in-depth. I now know that Dierrida comes from the Plato/Nietchze school of thought that human’s observation of external reality is limited by their sense perception. This has actually been scientifically proven at least in the sense that we know we cannot see the full spectrum of light. However, this idea has caused a whole rabbit whole of semiotics study where people try to understand words and what their meaning conveys and focuses on the imperfect means of conveying thought from one person to another. However, I think this thinking gets away from an appreciation of writing as an art and an appreciation of the artist themselves. If we remove the author and focus only on words, we remove an important element from the appreciation of art in my opinion. Until we learn to read each other’s minds, we will just have to accept the fact that some words will mean different things to different people. However, I do think Dierrida is correct in his focus on writing as an important form of communication and not just oral communication, which was the traditional focus for so many philosophers dating back to Aristotle and Plato. Writing was a new form of communication to the early Greeks and Dierrida acknowledges the significance of writing in our modern times. Even if writing is a “picture, reproduction, imitation of its content” it “will be the invariant trait of all progress to come” (1477). I must say I prefer written communication to oral when it comes to academics because you have time to really think about what you want to say and you can revise it. You cannot revise something you have said in person, and this can lead to regrettable circumstances. On the other hand, I prefer talking to close friends in person because I feel like the gestures and tone better communicate feelings. 

Truth, Lies, Literature, Rhetoric, Language, Composition, Nietzsche and Fred Newton Scott

Nietzsche was a brilliant philosopher who is often quoted and referenced in today’s modern philosophy, though he wasn’t as popular in his day because his ideas were so radically advanced for the time. His idea that all language is rhetorical is certainly fascinating and certainly very accurate when looking at it through the lens of semiotics as he does. Nietzsche was similar to John Locke and others in his ideas that words are metaphors for concepts. Humans cannot adequately understand the “essence” of things. Plato also felt there was an “essence” to things, or a “universal” that was imperceptible to the average human. Plato said that reality is “similar to something real, but it isn’t actually real. it looks as though it’s wrong to attribute full reality to a joiner or any artisan’s product.” Thus, Nietzsche ideas on language are similar to Plato's ideas on reality. Nietzsche said in Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense “Human beings... are deeply immersed in illusions and dream images; their eyes merely glide across the surface of things and see ‘forms’...” 

Locke also said that “words having no signification, the idea which each stands for must be learned and retained, by those who would exchange thoughts” (818). The Rhetorical Tradition also explains that “Locke argues that all ideas are mental combinations of sense perceptions and that words refer not directly to things but mental phenomena” (Bizzell 799). Thus, this is similar to Nietzsche's view of language who said “Is there a perfect match between things and their designation? Is language the full and adequate expression of all realities?...When different languages are set alongside one another it becomes clear that, where words are concerned, what matters is never truth, never the full adequate expression, otherwise there would no be so many languages….We believe that when we speak of trees, colours, snow, and flowers, we have knowledge of the things themselves, and yet we possess only metaphors of things which in no way correspond to the original entity.” Thus, he agrees that language is not a direct mechanism for communication and can be misinterpreted. hile Nietzsche does argue that language itself is in fact, false “regular and rigid new world is built from its own sublimated products-concepts-in order to imprison it in a fortresses.” The fortress of language is built upon cobwebs. It is fragile.

 However, he does not see this as much of a problem the way Plato and Locke do. Plato said “So if anyone is caught lying in our community...he is to be punished on the grounds that he’s introducing a practice which is just as liable to wreck and ruin a community." On the other hand, Nietzsche does not see what the big deal is about truth in the first place. Lying is how we preserve life: “As a means for the preservation of the individual, the intellect shows its greatest strengths in dissimulation [dishonesty], since this is the means to preserve those weaker, less robust individuals who, by nature, are denied horns or sharp fangs.” Instead of “horns” man was given intellect to protect itself. The truth can be scary or unpleasant. Human beings themselves have an unconquerable urge to let themselves be deceived, and they are as enchanted with happiness when the bard recites epic fairy-tales.” Thus, “truth is a comfortable lie.” 



But do we want to be lied to? To some degree rhetoric helps us seperate the “truth” from the “lies” even if these are both subjective. This leads to the ideas of someone like Berlin who looks at “the ways [rhetoric’s] very discursive structure can be read so as to favor one version of economic, social, and political arrangements over other versions… (477).  Every person delivering a persuasive message has “…assumptions about what is real, what is good, what is possible, and how power ought to be distributed” (Berlin 492). One must look at the motives of the speaker that inform their rhetoric if everyone is using the metaphor of language to deceive one another, there is always a motivation behind one’s deception. For example, if one compliments someone, even when they do not mean it, as Nietzsche refers to “white lies” it is usually to maintain a social order, or to advance in one’s career, or some other means to an end.  

Speaking of rhetoric with an agenda, the 19th century is when rhetoric began to make its split from literature, and the idea of “composition” instruction that we still use today took hold. Romantic literature especially began to bring to light the differences between “spontaneity, expression of feeling and imagination” of poetry with writers like Wordsworth, and the “planned discourse” that rhetoric is (995). Composition began to focus on “Bain’s modes of discourse and paragraph unity with Hill’s prescriptivism in grammar, usage and style” (995).  All of these “clear guidelines” are certainly the antithesis of spontaneous poetry meant to convey feelings, and the split between literary criticism and rhetoric makes some sense. In this more stripped-down form rhetoric does seem different than literature. Even though, a poet still has a rhetorical purpose in writing, even if that purpose is to convey feelings. They are certainly feelings they wish to convey more than others, so I would argue that literary criticism and poetry are still forms of rhetoric, especially looking at the way someone like Nietzsche writes where he combines poetry, aphorisms, philosophy and persuasion. But, for the purposes of categorization English departments and rhetoric began to part ways and rhetoric became the domain of speech classes. I thought it was interesting how “in the new middle-class colleges, composition was a required course taught by assistant professors and graduate assistants” (994). Certainly, this is still the case considering I am in the TA program at CSUN and I am currently a grad student about to teach a mandatory class in composition. Students still “generally hope to “leave this subject behind as soon as possible” (995). 

Fred Newton Scott was certainly ahead of his time as one of the only composition professors in the 19th century who believed “that composition is…a social act, and the student [should] therefore constantly [be] led to think of himself as writing or speaking for a specified audience. Thus, not mere expression but communication as well is made the business of composition.” This is much closer to the way we look at rhetoric today in a word where women and people of color finally have a voice, even if it is often subdued. He also though English departments should balance work in rhetoric and linguistics in addition to literary study, which was not done at the time. However, he would be happy to know that is what my graduate degree consists of today. 

Some Thoughts on Women in Rhetoric (since I'm writing a paper about it).

19^th century rhetoric is an interesting period because women were finally getting a major voice in public affairs. By the end of the eighteenth century in Europe and the United States, “women were still almost completely excluded from university education and were barred from the professions of law and political office” (Bizzell 986). But by the end of the nineteenth century, American women finally gained access to higher education at women’s colleges such as Vassar and they could study classical rhetoric at these institutions. Although, women had been writing for many years before this, it was finally publicly accepted for the most part.  

A major reason for the improvement in women’s education was the introduction of Protestant Christianity, which encouraged a less patriarchal view of spirituality. For example, in Scandinavia, Germany and England schools for girls increased because of Protestants who believed both men and women should at least be educated enough to read the bible and reflect upon its contents in order to have their own relationship with God. Bizzell explains that “women’s education was usually defended on the grounds that it made better Christians and more docile daughters and wives” (Bizzell 748-749).  Despite this, women began to feel that they answered to the higher authority of God even if men chastised them.

The Quakers, a radical protestant faction of Christianity, produced some of the first women orators. Margaret Fell was a well-known English Quaker leader who spoke in public on social issues, and preached and published on behalf of her faith, reminiscent of Margery Kemp some 200 years earlier. Fell argued that women as orators was justified by scripture. Fell stated, “we see Jesus owned the love and grace that appeared in women and did not despise it” (753). This paved the way for more and more Protestant women to begin speaking out on social issues.

The abolitionist movement and 1st wave feminist movement in the United States were closely linked as many African American women spoke up against the burdens of both slavery and womanhood. 

African American Maria W. Stewart was a religious woman in the early 1800’s who spoke out against slavery. She was criticized for speaking to mixed audiences of men and women as this was considered scandalous at the time (Bizzell 988). This was yet another attempt by the patriarchal western society to attack a strong female rhetorician’s credibility by labeling her as unchaste. 

Sojourner Truth was a very famous orator who “denounced slavery and the oppression of women” (Bizzell 989).  Though she never learned to read or write, she had a colloquial rhetorical style that appealed to white audiences and was very influential in pushing the agenda of rights for African American people of both sexes as well as women of all races. Thus, women have been on the forefront of progressive political movements in the United States since early in its history.

A Brief Rant on Code Switching since its Kinda my Thing Now

Mike Rose, who is well known in the field of education, wrote his ground breaking  essay “The Language of Exclusion” in 1985. Even though it is over 30 years old now, the problems he discusses still persist. In it he discusses an important idea known as the “Myth of Transience.” Transience basically says, “if we can do x or y, the problem [ of bad grammar] will be solved” (394). However, transience “blinds faculty members to historical reality” (395).  This reality includes  grammar correction as assimilation for Native Americans. it also comes from  early American education’s tendency to borrow terms from the medical community, which Rose discusses in his essay. For example, the word "remedial" comes from medical terms of the late 1800's and often refers to mental handicap. Hence, the idea of grammar correction as “diagnosis” of a problem (Rose 381). Freshman composition courses in college originated in 1874 “as a Harvard response to the poor writing of upperclassmen” and it “became and remained the most consistently required course in the American curriculum” (Rose 342). Thus, the idea of inferior and superior language was a major force in American education and still is today. This is a subject I have paid particular attention to in my graduate studies. 

Rose's ideas remind me of ideas also stated in  “Clueless in Academe” by Gerald Graff, who is well known for his writing instruction book They Say I Say. He differentiates between “student-speak” and “intellectual-speak.” He makes a powerful point about Academic language as seperate from native speech. Graff explains that, “The combination of [“studentspeak” and “Intellectualspeak] registers is more powerful that either alone” (42). Hence, I believe “intellectual-speak,” is a language, or at least a “language variety,” and should be recognized as such. Thus, switching between one’s home language and "intellectualspeak"  is a form of Code Switching, the practice of alternating between two or more languages or varieties. One language variety is not superior to the other. 

Although not all scholars who discuss this issue, like Rose or Graff, directly acknowledge that moving from Academic language to home language is code switching.  In my own tutoring and teaching experience thus far, I find that I am often explaining academic concepts in more easily understandable terms and students seem to appreciate this. Thus, code switching is essential to instructors and students alike. I have been asked by many students why we don’t write like how we talk, and this is a valid question. I answer this question by asking them to think of it as a new language, the “language of academia.” 

To foster inclusion for students, instructors should look at it as translating the home language into academic language, regardless of what that home language is. Jacqueline Jones Royster in her article says there is a “critical importance of the role of negotiator, someone who can cross boundaries and serve as guide and translator for others” especially in academia (34). This is the role that writing professors should play in my opinion, rather than brandishing the attitude that students are inferior like the educators described in Rose's essay.