For Tuesday, January 27:

Background reading:

Wikipedia entries (very short) on “Cult of True Womanhood” and “Republican Motherhood.”

Readings in PDF www.unm.edu/~sromano/english540

--Thomas, Teaching Rhetoric in the . . . Classical Period (intro to the received tradition)

--Kraditor, Introduction to Up from the Pedestal (“Kraditor Introductory Material”)

--Clark and Halloran’s Introductory essay in their edited collection Oratorical Culture in Nineteenth-Century America: Transformations . . . . (“Clark Halloran Introduction”)

--David Gold’s review of Bacon, The Humblest May Stand Forth (“Gold, Review Humblest”)

Introductions and Review articles

Reading Questions (you don’t have to do all of them—but try some to see if they’re productive):

--How does each author define “rhetoric”? (Fill in the blank as if you were this writer: “Rhetoric is . . . .”)

--Note date of publication. 

--What are some oppositions set up by each author, e.g., family v. autonomy; speech v. literacy; public v. domestic, mother v. ____?

--Describe intersections of race and gender. How does the author discuss these topics together?

--Note key terms that organize the reading (e.g. oratorical, delivery, individualism).

--Does the author challenge any received oppositions (e.g., women or African Americans did not study rhetoric)?

--Note when old concepts revisited and redefined (e.g., Lindal Buchanan’s work on delivery).

--What gets cited? What texts organize and authorize the discussion?

--What’s missing?

--What are main and secondary arguments?

--What’s assumed to be given knowledge?. What’s not a given for you?

--What does the author pitch as “news”?

--Begin making a list of primary materials: speeches, textbooks, conduct books.