The Schematization of Power: An Inscription

Perhaps I should begin this post by attempting to explain a little more fully why we chose to schematize our syllabus as we did. Through analyzing locations of power, we hoped that we would be able to group our readings together in fresh and productive ways. Where power is located (or where power should be located) seemed to be a highly contentious topic that also allowed for a great deal of nuance, because of the many locations and combinations possible. Additionally, through splitting our major locations of power into the textual and extra-textual, we were able to see if there were correlations between, for example, emphasizing argumentation and placing power in both the rhetor and the audience. This combination makes sense - if both the rhetor and the audience have agency in a rhetorical situation, then argumentation would be key - the rhetor must be able to construct a good argument, and the audience should be able to follow and consider an argument in order to be persuaded. Some of the authors that we believe place agency in both the rhetor and the audience also emphasize the importance of style and commonplaces, but they all share in common an understanding of rhetoric that makes argumentation an essential component of persuasion.

Some other correlations that I have noticed in our schema:

• All of the authors placed in the center of our schema, where the three circles (argumentation, style, commonplaces) overlap, include the rhetor (or place primary emphasis on the rhetor) as a key location of power in rhetoric. Perhaps this has something to do with the educational bent that many of the authors have? Is it possible to teach someone the arts of persuasion without also believing that they can potentially have the power to persuade?   
• All of the authors that are only in the argumentation section are male, whereas all of the authors that are in both the argumentation and the style section are female. Are these groupings indicative of a gender(ed) preference for particular means of persuasion?
• All of the authors that are in our "uncertain" category at least include, if not primarily emphasize, the non-human (by non-human, we mean anything that could be considered as existing apart from either the rhetor or the audience, i.e. history, culture, ambiance, space, etc.). Perhaps part of the reason why they are in our uncertain category is that when you begin to locate rhetorical power outside of the rhetor or the audience, it can lead to a turning away from the traditional textual features of rhetoric (commonplaces, argumentation, style) and towards something else.

Some of the value of our "uncertain" category I think derives from this indication of the existence of the potential for "something else" to be out there. Our schema is reductive, but it is also expansive. I think these two qualities are inseparable from the act of schematizing or categorizing. Creating schemas obscures some significant differences between various items that are grouped together, and seems to delimit what is possible by the act of naming what exists. But it is also expansive, because it enables a new vision that sees new connections and possibilities that were not easily seen without the power of organized information. The trouble with schemas is that sometimes the reductive nature of their construction is obscured and the schema is not seen as one situated method of understanding a select group of information, but rather as a depiction of reality. Creating "uncertain" categories reinforces the idea that this is a limited way of understanding, and that (in our case) there might be other textual features than these three, or that perhaps the power of rhetoric isn't located in textual features at all.

In the fervor of creating our schema, I think we got away from the idea of reorganizing our texts into a new syllabus; I wouldn't necessarily organize a syllabus around locations of power, but it is something that I might ask students to analyze or be sensitive to. In a reverse application of Berlin's analysis of Therborn's definition of ideology ("Rhetoric and Ideology in the Writing Class" 479), I think that attending to where power is located for particular authors helps me see what they view as possible or impossible, which is intimately connected to what they think is good, or how they define what exists. Being able to discern these aspects of an author's writing allows me to take on a different type of critical awareness, enabling me to understand and to accept or reject their ideas (or parts of their ideas) from a more informed perspective.