Rhetoric and Religion: Specific Questions

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 25, 2012 - 1:59pm.

I think it's actually a very important question, David, although let me complexify it a little. Several of the Jews on the list are, to my knowledge at least, NOT synagogue-goers. Two of them are. But all them would have been murdered by Hitler or targeted by radical Islamists. Similarly, I know many identify as "culturally Catholic," and, say, Tom Farrell, my PHD advisor who I know left the Church fairly early nonetheless had a Catholic funeral. It's sort of like the annoying "people of faith" thing I hear so often lately as a lame attempt at inclusion--Jews don't have a "faith" per se, simply varying degrees of "observance," and for groups like, say, Parsees or Sikhs for whom race/ethnicity/observance are inextricably entwined in ways that make no sense to US cafeteria Christianity, there are some problems. But it's funny, perhaps because I'm a Midwesterner and one who studies religion, that I actually know the affiliations of so many people on this list. .

a good resource

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 25, 2012 - 2:58pm.

and some more clews here:

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/rhetoric_and_public_affairs/toc/rap7.4.html

Wow . . .

Submitted by Daniel L Smith (not verified) on April 25, 2012 - 8:24am.

I can see this "hermeneutic" endeavor getting very messy (and contentious) quite easily - which is not to say it isn't worth pursuing.

Right...

Submitted by syntaxfactory on April 25, 2012 - 12:13pm.

...and I'm not really expecting any living people to post their own religious orientations. After all, of living people, we respect a division between public and private, professional and private, that we do not distinguish for the dead, for whom all aspects of biography are open game for understanding their intellectual work.

Ehninger

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 26, 2012 - 11:31am.

I seem to recall that Ehninger attended Trinity Episcopal Church in Iowa City. And Gronbeck is Lutheran.

others

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 26, 2012 - 11:37am.

Putnam, Southern Baptist
Hariman, Presbyterian (northern)
Hauser and Medhurst, RC
Hogan, UCC
Christians, Reformed

Judging just by last names, you have a disproportionate number of Jews, of course.

the more meta question

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 26, 2012 - 2:15pm.

"Rhetoric" exists right now as an odd conjuncture of writing, political/social theory, and the "field formerly known as speech." As Pat Gehrke and Josh Gunn and Bill Keith, among others, have taught us: Speech was weird. It never fit in to the dominant Discourse of the American University, but the untold story is that the US has been a mostly Protestant nation for most of its history, and "preaching" displaced ritual and the sacraments as the heart of worship. It is not surprising, then, that "speech" grew up as an at least partially cultural expression of the peculiar features of American life. One can no longer assume, of course, that people with PHD's in COMM, or even in Rhetoric, can display even rudimentary public speaking skills. Check out RSA in May. I won't name any names, but it fucking amazes me. I think I'm going to start campaigning to add a course in Voice and Articulation as a performance course option in our major. Right? Right? Um?

"Speech," homiletics,

Submitted by syntaxfactory on April 26, 2012 - 10:33pm.

It's funny you should note that; Bill and Pat point out the attempt to distinguish the Speech Art types (the SAA members of 1890-1920) from the Public Speaking types without any mention of education in homiletics or preaching, right?

There were the elocutionists on the left, the academic teachers of public speaking on the right, and the teachers of preachers where? Affect, rationality, and faith, where faith is absent in the narrative?

I don't have the evidence, but. .

Submitted by Jim Aune on April 26, 2012 - 10:58pm.

methinks it was so taken for granted that it didn't come up.

I started by adding A. Craig Baird's possible Presbyterian roots

Submitted by syntaxfactory on April 24, 2012 - 10:48pm.

I started by adding A. Craig Baird's possible Presbyterian roots based on seminary attendance.

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