On Campbell and Inquiry (and Other Things ...)

Hello, Everyone:

As promised, I report today's discussion questions here, in case they can be useful as you work through your trace of Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric.

1. Reflect on the table of contents: What do you notice? Where does emphasis appear to be in the treatise? How is it organized, and what can that organization tell you about the “new rhetoric”
2. What is the audience’s role in making knowledge, and how informed do you think Campbell thinks the audience is or needs to be?
3. In what way do Campbell’s attitudes toward hearers affect (disrupt or complicate or destabilize) efforts to see rhetoric as inquiry?
4. Suppose we want to present Campbell as a reformer or innovator—where do we have a case for this claim?
5. How does Campbell approach the oral and written? To what extent does he focus on one to the harm or detriment of the other?

At this point in your tracing -- and because this is an extremely rich text in all of your trace concepts -- be prepared to have your first sense of your trace "terms" shaken up, or disrupted slightly. Feel free to rely on the questions on your heuristic and on finding new ways to answer them in this text.

Looking forward to your findings,

-Dr. Graban