While reading Grant-Davie's article on rhetorical situations and the surrounding factors that affect them, I couldn't help but wonder if he seemed to leave out some important possibilities that could happen in the situations that involve the discourse he is analyzing. In the article, he discusses how exigence becomes the situation that is in need of the audience and the rhetors to respond to it in order to become more coherent. This makes enough sense. This appears to be the normal study of cause and effect, or at least bearing some similarity to it. But he doesn't seem to grasp how free will among humans could affect these situations in rare occasions. Someone in the audience could chose not to respond to the situation, immediately discounting the discourse. Or someone could respond to the discourse in a different way, resulting in an unexpectedly positive or negative outcome that the discourse didn't intend to pursue.
While reading the article of what rhetoric means, I was actually taken aback by how the authors describe those who shape rhetoric to fit a specific idea and pursue their own personal interests. They describe these individuals as "special interest groups." Most people think of this term as groups that pursue their own agendas and manipulate government officials, law enforcement officials, and other authority figures to do their bidding. I was just struck by the way they seemed to bring real social ideas into the discussion of language and comparing how people can affect society and language in similar ways using similar tactics.
I think that rhetoric, as our means of communication, can't NOT change society...it's action, there is no change without action.
ReplyDeleteAlso, relating to exigence, even if the audience responds in a way unexpected by the rhetor, it's still exigence... I think exigence is independent of the rhetor and intended audience.