Berlin’s Rhetoric and Reality

James Berlin is a self-identified Marxist (or neo-Marxist) writing a history (or historiography)about the material conditions (“The transformations that occur in a society’s rhetorics are also related to larger social and political developments”) and various epistemologies (“every rhetorical system is based on epistemological assumptions about the nature of reality, the nature of knower, and the rules governing the discovery and communication of the known”) influencing rhetorical + Composition studies in the late ninteenth and 20th centuries (4). Rhetoric and Reality is usually considered a fairly seminal text within Comp/Rhet programs, though it many people contest the ideology and methods in which Berlin engages.

Chapter 1: An Overview

Berlin begins by laying out the three basic epistemological camps which he uses to distinguish the various pedagogical theories toward the teaching of writing that have occured in the twentieth century. These catagories are: The Objective, The Subjective, and The Transactional (note–Berlin does not capitolize these camps, that is my representation of his use of these terms as monolithic labels).

Objective– This is a positivistic epistemology, one that assumes that the nature of Truth (capitol) exists in the real world and is an objective, positive, knowable Truth. In order to be real, something must be empirically validated. We can see it, measure it, logic it, etc. This epistemology primarily shows itself through CTR (current-traditional rhetoric). CTR tends to rely on a conduit model of language (“Language is regarded at worst as a distorting medium that alters the original perception, and at best as a transparent device that captures the original experience so that it might be reproduced in the faculties of one’s audience”)(8). Or, in other words, if we can only find the right words to convey our meaning, then everyone can understand what we understand. CTR also focuses on “the modes of discourse, with special emphasis on exposition and it’s forms – analysis, classification, cause-effect, and so forth” (9). The idea is that, if we choose the right words and the right method of conveying them, then the right cause/correct idea/Truth will also prevail.

Subjective– Berlin’s first sentence sums up pretty well: “Subjective theories of rhetoric located truth either within the individual or within a realm that is accessible only through the individual’s internal apprehension, apart from the empirically verifiable sensory world” (11). This is the epistemic drive behind what we know of as “expressivist” theories (think Murray and Elbow). One issue that Berlin brought up that I was a little unsure on was the idea of Plato falling into the subjective category. Berlin claims that Plato is subjective because Truth for Plato only exists in an “unchanging realm of ideas” which can only be reached by private vision. So, because Truth is realized privately and internally, Berlin classifies this as subjective. However, I’m not sure I buy that, because Plato still believes in a singular ultimate Truth, which we can all understand (the same in the end). So while his methods of discovery ring to me as subjective, his nature of Truth sounds fairly objective.

Besides that though, Berlin discusses how this theory takes into account the phenomenn of “genius” and the un-teach-ability of writing because it is so private and individual. Focus, then, is on getting students to understand and express their own unique perspectives of the world in different and creative ways, focusing on creative metaphors as explanation of that which cannot be truly explained.

Transactional — Again, a good first-sentence summary: “Transactional rhetoric is based on an epistemology that sees truth as arising out of the interaction of the elements of the rhetorical situation: an interaction of subject and object or of subject and audience or even of all the elements – subject, object, audience, and language – operating simultaneously” (15). Berlin then broke transaction down into three further categories: the classical, the cognitive, and the epistemic. The classical focuses on discourse communities in which people will disagree but action must still take place. It does not deal with certainties, but with disputable perspectives and ranging through all aspects of human interaction – emotional, aesthetic, ethical, etc., as well as logical. Cognitive rhetorics focus on the transaction between the mind and nature. “The teacher intervenes in the composing process of students in order to ensure that their cognitive structures re functioning normally, thus enhacing their abilities to arrive at truth in examing the external world” (16). Epistemic rhetoric involves the dialogue between all aspects (speaker, audience, text, matieral world, etc) because it views all these aspects as verbal constructs instead of separating into verbals and non-verbals. “All truths arise out of dialectic, out oof the interaction of individuals within discourse communities” (16-17).

Chapter 2: Nineteenth Century Background

In this chapter Berlin lays out some of the basic institutional changes that brought about the insertion of First-Year Composition classes in the college curriculum. Though we may feel that Comp/Rhet history has always been tied to the First-Year writing program, we sprang originally from the Rhetoric courses taken primarily by upperclassmen, a subject intended to refine students rather than a prepatory course. He discusses the implementation of a writing entrance exam (at Harvard, of course, in 1847 and taken up by most other colleges eventually) that pushed pressure onto High School teachers to cover the basics of writing and rhetoric. The First-Year writing program was instigated for students who hadn’t quite mastered the art of writing before coming to college. English departments were then able to claim that their primary focus was on literature, and began to divorce themselves from issues of rhetoric and writing. A distinction was made between “rhetoric” which consisted of argumentation, exposition, etc. and “poetic” which included literature, poetry, and the “creative” stuff. The inception of a writing entrance test eventually led to a Uniform Reading List that high school teachers were also forced to teach if their students were to be prepared for college. Berlin considers the rise of science to be a major reason that writing began to be viewed as a practical skill rather than a part of the arts.

To be continued…..