Ageless Rhetoric

After reading the first chapter of Contemporary Perspectives of Rhetoric, I can only come to the conclusion that there is not only one, but many, definitions for the term “rhetoric”. The authors of the book have been nice enough to give us an introduction to the big dilemma surrounding its meaning and I say a big dilemma because, since there are many definitions for the term, many people that have studied and taught anything dealing with how we communicate with each other are therefore rhetoric students and teachers without really acknowledging their use of rhetoric.  According to the authors, however, there might be a common definition for the term among those who have dedicated a portion of their lives to study rhetoric. For the authors, rhetoric is “an art and a discipline that facilitates our understanding of the nature and function of symbols in our lives” (Foss et al. 1). But for those of us, who will probably never study the matter, the term “rhetoric” could mean something as simple as a channel of communication through the use of symbols. Since anything we use to communicate with each other is rhetoric, whenever we use, a word or a picture, a letter or an email, a call or an IM or anything else that helps us express our feelings and needs we are using rhetoric.

Now, when we take rhetoric and the digital world we empower ourselves with some very powerful tools. To me, digital cultures are groups of people who use technology to enhance their communication. Some examples of the digital cultures that I personally use take place through my phone and my pc. With my phone I am able to call, text or IM with many people. With my pc, I am able join formal and informal digital cultures. I do personal and professional emailing and messaging and I have been a part of MySpace, Facebook, Hi5, Deezer, Qpasa and other social sites at one point or another.  Anything I type, paste or embed is rhetoric. Anything on my profile, whether is it my pictures, my background, my videos, my music and even my username are symbols that empower me with the possibility of communicating with others becoming not just a representation of what they are, but also a representation of what I am, what I want to be or whom I was at one time, what I feel, what I want or even what I don’t want. Anything that I post or don’t post online helps represent me with the rest of the individuals in that digital culture and if it helps me communicate with others is rhetoric.

Works Cited

Foss, Sonja K., Karen A. Foss, and Robert Trapp. Contemporary Perspectives on Rhetoric. Third Edition. Waveland Press, 1-15. PDF.