We will assimilate you

The readings this week cover a period that I find personally fascinating. The spread of a language, a culture, a system of religion,and a set of political ideas by military conquest and aggressive exploration seems to go back to the discussion that started last week's class. Why was the military man Odysseus condemned for manipulation through oratory that led to the death of a comrade? The power of the military to shape cultures through the practical interaction of conqueror and the conquered has always been enormous, and the example of Alexander is only one of many. The reshaping of the world by the Roman soldiery and the spread of Islamic culture and religion by conquest are two more. Let's not even get started on British colonialism. The Philosopher King of the Republic may have in fact found its actual manifestation in the person of the Philosopher General. Even though Alexander and Julius may not be regarded as true philosophers, both would have received some degree of the enkyklios paideia described in the text and both were skilled speakers--whether or not they would have been called orators by the popular schools of the day, I do not really know. They certainly could inspire the troops and the common populous. Their intrusions onto the world scene reshaped the intellectual, spiritual, and political landscapes of the globe. So the power and spread of philosophy and and rhetoric may have relied on the insight and integrity of the military whose overt function is conquest, domination, and assimilation of other cultures.Even though this may not be stated in the texts, it is certainly implied in the historical chronologies that are presented. Conley points out the gradual assimilation of pagan rhetoric into Christian rhetoric/apologetics. Augustine and other church doctors were suspicious of the principles of rhetoric taught in the Greek and Roman schools, but by the end of the fourth century both the principles and methodologies of those schools were being used by the church in the evangelism of pagan societies . As the religion spread and became the dominant influence, these ideas spread as well. Maybe the strains of "Onward Christian Soldiers" carry more of history than might be imagined.



As a composition teacher, I took exception to the readings last week that essentially said that any idiot could write. This week I felt validated by the breakdown of the art of rhetoric into five components and the analysis of a speech into five parts. These elements continue today as the basis for evaluating the strength of exposition/expository writing. Hermagoras' stasis theory also seems to open up a modern parallel in the current academic infatuation with and demand for "sources" to establish the credibility of a work--"applicable arguments drawn from the appropriate 'places' "(32), sure sounds like sources to me.



A parting question--Does anyone else notice the absence of the Cynics up to this point in our discussion of topics common to rhetorical development? Granted, they were rather outlandish, but Antisthenes was one of Socrates' more prominent students. Much of what Aristotle presents in his Polis seems like a reaction against the Cynics' demand for self-sufficiency and self-reliance even at the cost of social conventions and approval. The Cynics had little use for speculative philosophies and saw the good life and virtue in terms of the natural and the practical--an ideal that the text ascribes to both Cicero and to Quintilian. Cicero saw the Cynics as somewhat ridiculous, but they were the group that sowed the seeds for the development of Stoicism, an influence that would have been in harmony with the stated/written sentiments of both Cicero and Caesar. The positions that the Cynics took on self-discipline, material simplicity, and moral responsibility based on natural laws are echoed in the Gospels, the Pauline epistles, and the teachings/rhetoric of the Christian ascetics. So where are they--those radical BCE hippies?