Week 6 -- "Fie on the Falsehood of Men"

I have selected female rhetoricians Jane Anger and Rachel Speght as the foci of my reading response paper. I chose these two women for a number of reasons: each accomplished some "first" (e.g. Anger holds status as the first woman to be on paper for discussing how language constructs gender and Speght holds such in regards to pointing out the real-world implications jokes and banter on women have), each writes in extremely poetic, pleasing styles (both use imagery, metaphors, and analogies), and to each I responded with some kind of emotion or excitement ignited by the passion both demonstrate while making their plea or call to action. My (working) thesis will focus on analyzing the similarities of their rhetorical styles, but will also note definitive differences between these two women. Main points to support this thesis will include looking at their approach to their message, how they construct it, the content within, and to whom each targets her message. One particular difference I noted rests in how they each make their arguments in terms of language and citations. Anger displays in indirect ways her level of education by noting the gods and goddesses and drawing on the Surfeiter's book for her argument. Contrarily, Speght demonstrates a comprehensive and profound education, particularly in regard to Latin, classical literature, and rhetoric. For instance, she draws on Socrates to make her argument against Swetname in "Mouzell for Melastomus."
In looking at theses two authors, I chose the best method of comparison would be to do a rhetorical analysis. In this regard I can analyze how they insure their credibility, how they arranged their piece and why, which rhetorical appeal they most implement, and where strengths and weaknesses exist within each piece of writing. Also, I plan to include some cultural and social context of the Renaissance, when both women made their arguments. For example, I believe the dominant views of the "natural" condition of women at that time is significant to understanding both Speght's and Anger's writings.

Annotated Bibliography

For an upcoming reading response paper, my professor asked that we write an annotated bibliographic on two sources we found. Below, I have done so, using Meg Lota Brown's article on Rachel Speght and A. Lynn Magnusson's on Jane Anger. For my paper, I will be analyzing the works of Speght and Anger, as well as comparing them and examining cultural context surrounding their work.

Brown, Meg Lota. “Rachel Speght.” Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 126. Ed. M.       Thomas Hester. Detroit: Gale Research, 1993. Literature Resource Center. Web. 11 February 2011.

      Brown discusses everything from Speght’s life to her few pieces of writing. She reveals that while no evidence supporting Speght’s formal education, Speght’s writing clearly demonstrates a grasp of rhetoric and classical literature as well as contemporary, and an understanding of Latin and the Bible. She also points to contemporary reaction to “Mouzell for Melastomus” including Speght’s complaint in a later work that few people credited the work to herself but rather to her father, James Speght.

      For my paper, Brown’s analysis of Speght’s “Mouzell for Melastomus” will certainly help in that Brown focuses on Speght’s analogy of Adam and Eve to the modern standing of men and women. She also points at Speght’s approach differing from Swetnam’s as far as restraint in “argument and tone.” I particularly found Brown’s mention of Speght as a “protofeminist” interesting. Having never heard that word before, I looked it up and now understand the term to refer to “feminists” prior to the 20^th Century when the word actually surfaced. This will provide another lens through which I can analyze both Speght and Anger, looking at them both as precursors to feminism despite neither of them yet arguing women’s status below men.

Magnusson, A. Lynn. “Jane Anger.” Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 136. Ed. David A. Richardson. Detroit: Gale Research, 1994. Literature Resource Center. Web. 11 February 2011.

       Magnusson begins by noting that no knowledge of Jane Anger’s life exists and quickly moves on to dispel an argument made by some that a male authored Anger’s writing. She goes on to interpret Anger’s “Her Protection for Women” by highlighting key phrases and attacks on “Boke, His Surfeit on Love.” In doing so, she highlights how Anger made the first real defense of women by women as well as making an attack on men in the process. She extends her protection not just to virtuous women, but the feminine sex in general. Magnusson also emphasizes the way Anger reworks the Surfeiter’s arguments against him as well as uses popular tools of male rhetoric to form female rhetoric of the time.

       Magnusson’s interpretations of Anger’s work have implications for my paper in regards to identifying the importance of how Anger twisted instruments of male rhetoric around and used them in her own way. This will help in my own discussion of Anger’s work in comparison to Rachel Speght’s. Additionally, Magnusson identifies important cultural context surrounding Anger’s work pertinent to my own analysis.

Education or Indoctrination?

We often hear, as in middle and high school, about how Lincoln "freed the slaves." If any of you are like me, you probably thought he sounded like a swell guy. Not so much. I haven't decided if the "stories" I learned in my history classes had to be simplified as a casualty of  a brimming curriculum or if teachers were told not to rock the boat and to make all the presidents sound like superheros, bereft of flaws.

On my first day of American History in high school, the teacher asked a question (I can't recall what it was) in regards to the class discussion of the British. I flippantly responded with my knowledge of all the people the British have historically enslaved, slaughtered, and culturally decimated under the guise of conquering (I purposely put "historically" because I really don't have anything against the British, I just don't believe in rewriting history in order to not make a race of people sound bad; no one cuts Germany any slack so why the British?). Apparently this was not the answer he wanted to hear. Brushing my answer aside, he went on to the point he wanted to make. In this way, students learn to disregard what tests, teachers, and the curriculum do not require them to know. They focus singularly on what's "important" (aka, predominantly white, male, and upper-class) and ignore sidebar stories (aka, women, racial minorities, and the lower-class).

I remember beginning to question my education as far back as seventh grade. My textbook had condensed the Irish potato famine into a paragraph. It flabbergasted me. As third generation Irish, I'm a little ways off of being able to claim that as my race. However, my father, proud of his Irish heritage, has made the culture and history a strong part of my upbringing. I won't go into another of my tirades about what actually happened, but I couldn't believe that such a tragic incidence of genocide had been so measly wrapped up into a paragraph and pushed aside. Again, Americans didn't want to make the British look bad.

Through these incidences, I learned that Americans value individualism, success, and achievement. I have trouble accepting these ideas because I know what lurks behind some of these "achievements." I know that for every race that looks strong, progressive, and dominant, another race lies trampled upon and oppressed. I mentioned Lincoln earlier and how he "freed the slaves" and went to war with the south over "slavery." First of all, you can discover those falsities on your own. Secondly, as Sherman Alexie draws notice to in his book "War Dances," in 1862 (one year before the Emancipation Proclamation, if you recall) Lincoln ordered the execution of 300 Sioux Indians, condemned in unfair trials. So if classes that place emphasis on certain people while leaving others out, reinforcing ideals and values by omission, do not qualify as rhetoric in the sense that they sway how people think about and view the world, I'm not sure what does.

Rhetoricians of Antiquity -- Sappho and Aspasia

For this week's posting, my professor has asked my class to discuss and compare the aforementioned female rhetoricians. I find myself hesitant and I struggle with the topic. The idea that the work of these two women barely survived only to be retained in fragments or kept alive through other's words inhibits my ability to compare them. What I know of Sappho especially seems to be written through biased lenses. Regardless of the translation, her poems tend to deal with interpersonal love on the whole whereas Aspasia's one surviving speech has a political focus. However, they both describe love profoundly. One writes of it in regards to other people and to the beauty around her, whereas the other writes of love in regard to the city of Athens and its beauty and nobility.
Another idea that plagues me deals with the lack of credit society gave these women. I know that some people out there might say, "But some considered Sappho the tenth muse!" or "Plato kept Aspasia's speech alive!" I argue that, flattering as it was, they received superficial credit. Few citizens of their country and their day looked and them and though that if these two women could be such rhetorical masters after claiming an education that maybe other women could as well. Instead, as Marie Delcourt points out, as quoted in Cheryl Glenn's "Sex, Lies, and Manuscript: Refiguring Aspasia in the History of Rhetoric," "It was all too amazing to be proper; and Aspasia was so brilliant she could not possibly be respectable." As we learned in class from reading Barbara Biesecker's "Coming to Terms with Recent Attempts to Write Women Into the History of Rhetoric," Aspasia's situation represents the very idea of female tokenism. Society found it distasteful a woman should be so educated, despite the men who flocked to her for knowledge. Her esteem did nothing to raise up the women around her either. Sappho and Aspasia seem more than other women, rather than being average women given a chance at education.

Week 2 -- Tariq Ramadan's Rhetoric on Islam and Feminism

While Feminism in the States still has significance and relevance to modern society, I yet find myself distracted by Feminism in other cultures across the globe. I had hoped to take International Women's Studies last semester but a lack of sufficient enrollment resulted in cancellation of the class. When the opportunity to view an oral presentation and discuss the importance of the speech to women's issues arose, go figure the title of Tariq Ramadan's keynote speech at one of the Salzburg Global Seminars caught my attention: "Tariq Ramadan on Islamic Feminism and Women's Leadership."
The religion of Islam and women's status in Islamic nations and cultures has long held my curiosity, but due to time constraints I have yet had the freedom to research it. Now, I have a starting point from which to further inform myself of the religion itself as well as interpretations of it. Ramadan, a Professor of Contemporary Islamic Issues at Oxford University, has published several books on Islam and its place in the modern world. These facts coupled with his eloquence in speaking as well as his presence at the Salzburg Seminars gives him a great sense of credibility. Additionally, he speaks with an authority on the issue, conveying well to his audience his personal ties to the subject.
In his discussion of Islam, he points out that as Muslims have moved to different countries such as Europe, where he was raised, and the states, they begin to see the differences between culture and religion. Much of the fundamentalist teachings, he states, result more from the culture of Islam's origin rather than deriving from religious texts. In this way, he reaches out to his audience by speaking globally and by explaining variations and evolutions in a way that non-Muslims can understand.
His power of persuasion relies upon his credibility, his ability to connect with his audience and in the way he explains this transitory period in the Islamic faith. "We are in a transitory period, and we have to understand that it is to be a very long process." This quote in particular appeals to my knowledge of my own culture's transition in its view of women. I think some of my North American counterparts are quick to frustration in regards to other countries and their culture or religion; they quickly assess them with an ethnocentric view and think of them as backward or evil and don't stop to realize that some of those behaviors or attitudes are not so far behind in our own nation's history. Even today, some women in the U.S. must endure unequal pay or a lack of opportunities due to stereotypes, religious influence, and cultural stigmas. We have to recognize that other countries need to go through some of the same steps our country went through of their own volition. Ramadan's speech clues us in to the fact that Islamic culture has begun its transition and we should respect from our own experience how long that may take.
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Do--YdH-888

Week 1 Response -- Define Rhetoric

 Hello all!

I've created this blog as a requirement for my Women and Gender Studies 310 class; however, I am excited at the opportunity to manage my first blog and hope that it becomes a hobby I can pursue, requirement or not. 

So for this week's posting, my professor has asked my classmates and myself to define rhetoric in our own words. We're also supposed to think of modern day examples of rhetoric which has constrained or empowered women. First of all, I'm not a real literature guru. I love reading and analyzing texts but before this class, "rhetoric" lacked tangible meaning for me. I hear the word frequently around campus, but failed to discover a concrete definition. Though I now understand rhetoric includes a diverse range of media used to convey a message to a specific audience, I initially thought rhetoric constituted writing and language alone. Instead, the word usually conjured an image inside my head: that of a politician or religious figure (usually male) bellowing their ideas forth from behind some kind of altar or platform. I never thought of philosophy or art. Now that I open my mind to it, I think of Frida Kahlo and her wildly organic, intensely personal, and emotionally riveting paintings. I also think of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's short story, "The Yellow Wall-paper." At the time I read and re-read it I thought it to be simply an interesting story attacking the masculinity of medicine in her time. Now I can see how she used her own condition to convey to other women that their struggle to be "cured" failed not because of their lacking, but the lacking of their male doctors to validate their right to speak. Probably less well-known would be the artists in the group Guerrilla Girls. The Guerrilla Girls create flyers, t-shirts, books and the like to push support for female artists and their right to be showcased equally with male artists in art museums. Their efforts parallel those attempting to get female rhetoricians read alongside male rhetoricians like the authors of our textbook "Available Means." My favorite example of Guerrilla Girls' paintings criticizes the Venice Biennale for keeping works of female artists in the basement by depicting a woman on all fours beneath a man. The painting reads, "Where are women artists of Venice? Beneath the men." Their art empowers women by not only attacking museums that discriminate against female artists, but by encouraging women to allow their oppression to inspire them instead of defeating them.