Exam 9: Contemporary Rhetoric I: Arguments, Audiences, Advocates

A theory of audience is central to the rhetorical theory of Chaim Perelman and L. Olbrechts-Tyteca in their The New Rhetoric. Briefly describe the role played by any three of the audiences they discuss, focusing on the part played by each audience in ensuring that discourse is rational.

What do Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca mean by the "universal audience"? What function does this idea have in their theory?

Which of the following is not one of the conditions of communicative competence Habermas outlines in order to produce rational communication in the public sphere?

One problem facing modern Western society is its inability to provide a framework for reasoning about questions of value and action. Describe the solution to this problem suggested by Chaim Perelman and L. Olbrechts-Tyteca. What is at the heart of their solution? In what ways can their proposal be understood as rhetorical in nature? Is their proposed approach likely to provide a solution to the problem they pose themselves? Does their theory have something to offer by way of providing a means of reasoning reliably about questions of value and action?

The ___________________ is Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca's imagined audience of highly rational individuals that is used to test the reasonableness of arguments and transcend local and personal biases.

Perelman and Obrechts-Tyteca's starting points of argumentation connect with which of the following concepts of Aristotle?

Perleman and Obrechts-Tyteca divide the starting points of argumentation into two categories; the first category is "the real," which of the following is the second category of starting points that deals with commonly held values and value hierarchies?

Which of the following is the rhetorical metaphor Charles Darwin used to communicate his theory of evolution in a more positive light?

To support his theory of evolution, Charles Darwin used examples of violence in nature to argue that God allows cruelties because they would eventually lead to more advanced forms of life.

Provide the term for the following definitions: -In Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, an audience of trained specialists in a discipline.

What do Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca mean by their concept of the "universal audience," and why is it important to their theory of argument?

Are you persuaded by the arguments of scientists like Simon, Geertz, McCloskey, and Campbell that the natural and social sciences have a distinctly rhetorical dimension to them? Does such an idea violate your notion of science as objective? Should it?

In what different ways are the natural and social sciences presented as rhetorical by writers discussed in this chapter?

Provide the term for the following definitions: -In Habermas, the interactive process of critical argumentation crucial to overcoming ideological domination.

As opposed to other "Rhetoric of X" fields, David J. Depew and John Lyne describe the ___________________ as a field of study as matured, well established, and can be broken up into sixteen separate genres of rhetorical research.

Provide the term for the following definitions: -In Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, an imagined audience consisting of the whole of mankind, or at least, of all normal, adult persons.

Provide the term for the following definitions: -In Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, points of agreement between a rhetor and an audience which allow for argumentation to develop.

Which of the following scholars believes that "we have extended the range of rhetoric to include discourse types … that the ancients would have regarded as falling outside its purview," and that including all symbolic realms within rhetoric is careless?

What, according to Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, are the benefits of argumentation before a single listener?

Provide the term for the following definitions: -In Habermas, rules for using and understanding language rationally.