This book examines the reception of rhetoric and the rhetoric of reception. By considering salient rhetorical traits of rhetorical utterances and texts seen in context, and relating this to different kinds of reception and/or audience use and negotiation, the authors explore the connections between rhetoric and reception. In our time, new media and new forms of communication make it harder to distinguish between speaker and audience. The active involvement of users and audiences is more important than ever before. This project is based on the premise that rhetorical research should reconsider the understanding, conceptualization and examination of the rhetorical audience. From mostly understanding audiences as theoretical constructions that are examined textually and speculatively, the contributors give more attention to empirical explorations of actual audiences and users. The book will provide readers with new knowledge on the workings of rhetoric as well as illustrative and guiding examples of new methods of rhetorical studies.

This book approaches the topic of argumentation from the perspective of audiences, rather than the perspective of arguers or arguments.

This book sets out a framework for investigating audience responses to political discourse. It starts from the premise that audiences are active participants who bring their own background knowledge and political standpoint to the communicative event. To operationalise this perspective, the volume draws on concepts from classical rhetoric alongside contemporary research in cognitive stylistics and cognitive linguistics (including schema theory, Text World Theory, Cognitive Grammar, and mind-modelling, amongst others). It examines the role played by the speaker’s identity, the arguments they make, and the emotions of the audience in the – often critical – reception of political text and talk, using a diversity of examples to illustrate this three-dimensional approach – from political speeches, interviews and newspaper articles, to more creative text-types such as politicised rap music, television satire and filmic drama. The result of this wide-ranging application is a holistic and systematic account of the rhetorical and ideological effects of political discourse in reception.

A one-stop source for scholars and advanced students who want to get the latest and best overview and discussion of how organizations use rhetoric While the disciplinary study of rhetoric is alive and well, there has been curiously little specific interest in the rhetoric of organizations. This book seeks to remedy that omission. It presents a research collection created by the insights of leading scholars on rhetoric and organizations while discussing state-of-the-art insights from disciplines that have and will continue to use rhetoric. Beginning with an introduction to the topic, The Handbook of Organizational Rhetoric and Communication offers coverage of the foundations and macro-contexts of rhetoric—as well as its use in organizational communication, public relations, marketing, management and organization theory. It then looks at intellectual and moral foundations without which rhetoric could not have occurred, discussing key concepts in rhetorical theory. The book then goes on to analyze the processes of rhetoric and the challenges and strategies involved. A section is also devoted to discussing rhetorical areas or genres—namely contextual application of rhetoric and the challenges that arise, such as strategic issues for management and corporate social responsibility. The final part seeks to answer questions about the book’s contribution to the understanding of organizational rhetoric. It also examines what perspectives are lacking, and what the future might hold for the study of organizational rhetoric. Examines the advantages and perils of organizations that seek to project their voices in order to shape society to their benefits Contains chapters working in the tradition of rhetorical criticism that ask whether organizations’ rhetorical strategies have fulfilled their organizational and societal value Discusses the importance of obvious, traditional, nuanced, and critically valued strategies such as rhetorical interaction in ways that benefit discourse Explores the potential, risks, paradoxes, and requirements of engagement Reflects the views of a team of scholars from across the globe Features contributions from organization-centered fields such as organizational communication, public relations, marketing, management, and organization theory The Handbook of Organizational Rhetoric and Communication will be an ideal resource for advanced undergraduate students, graduate students, and scholars studying organizational communications, public relations, management, and rhetoric.

Providing a comprehensive survey of the empirical research, theory, and history of public speaking, this handbook fills a crucial gap in public speaking pedagogy resources and provides a foundation for future research and pedagogical development. Bringing together contributions from both up-and-coming and senior scholars in the field, this book offers a thorough examination of public speaking, guided by research across six key themes: the history of public speaking; the foundations of public speaking; issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion; considerations of public speaking across contexts; assessment of public speaking; and the future of public speaking in the twenty-first century. The evidence-based chapters engage with a broad discussion of public speaking through a variety of viewpoints to demonstrate how subtopics are connected and fraught with complexity. Contributors explore public speaking in education, business and professional settings, and political contexts, and outline how skills learned through public speaking are applicable to interpersonal, small group, and business interactions. Reinforcing the relevance, importance, and significance of public speaking in individual, interpersonal, social, and cultural communication contexts, this accessibly written handbook will be an indispensable resource for public speaking instructors and program administrators. It will also be valuable reading for Communication Pedagogy and Introduction to Graduate Studies courses.

In this provocative and forcefully written book, Steven Mailloux takes issue with the validity of a number of distinctions commonly made in contemporary literary theory and cultural studies--distinctions between theory and history, reader and text, truth and ideology, aesthetics and politics. Mailloux first presents the case for a rhetorical hermeneutics and against foundationalist theories of interpretation. Doing hermeneutic theory, he argues, entails doing rhetorical history. By means of a detailed analysis of reader-response criticism, he highlights the connections between institutional politics and the interpretive rhetoric of academic literary criticism. Mailloux then uses Adventures of Huckleberry Finn as an exemplary text. Relating Mark Twain's rhetoric to the cultural politics of post-Reconstruction debates about racist ideology, he places his reader-oriented interpretation within the rhetorical history of controversies over the meaning and value of Huckleberry Finn. Finally, in a far-ranging study of cultural reception, he juxtaposes the twentieth-century concern about the topic of race in Huckleberry Finn with the nineteenth-century audience's very different concerns about juvenile delinquency and the "bad-boy boom." In the final part of the book, Mailloux restates his critique of foundationalist hermeneutics through readings of Ken Kesey, Michel Foucault, Edward Said, and Richard Rorty, and he concludes by examining the role of rhetoric and theory in a congressional dispute over the Reagan administration's reinterpretation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Rhetorical Power will be welcomed by readers in literary theory and American studies, as well as in such fields as speech communication, the sociology of culture, and social and intellectual history, and by others interested in the politics of persuasion.

Featuring roughly sixty specially commissioned essays by an international cast of leading rhetoric experts from North America, Europe, and Great Britain, the Handbook will offer readers a comprehensive topical and historical survey of the theory and practice of rhetoric from ancient Greece and Rome through the Middle Ages and Enlightenment up to the present day.