Internal Rhetorics: Toward a History and Theory of Self-Persuasion

188 Pages·2001·14.32 MB·English

by  Jean Neinkamp

internal Rhetorics
This page intentionally left blank
Internal Rhetorics
Toward a History
and Theory
of Self-Persuasion
Jean Nienkamp
Southern Illinois University Press
Corbonate and Edwardsville
Copyright © 2001 by the Board of Trustees,
Southern Illinois University
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
04 03 02 01 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nienkamp, Jean.
Internal rhetorics : toward a history and theory of self-
persuasion /Jean Nienkamp.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Ethics. 2. Rhetoric—Philosophy. 3. Persuasion (Rheto-
ric) 4. Self-talk. I. Title.
BJ42 .N54 2001
128'.4-dc21 2001018401
ISBN 0-8093-2406-7 (alk. paper)
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum
requirements of American National Standard for Information
Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials,
ANSI Z39.48-1992. (S3)
Dedicated to the memory ofWilma Robb Ebbitt
(1918-2000), whose trenchant thinking and writing,
warm mentorship, and fierce advocacy for the importance
of teaching in the academy have inspired her Penn State
progeny.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
Preface
Introduction
Part One. Internal Rhetoric in History:
Perspectives on Moral Reasoning
1, Classical Variations on Internal Rhetoric
2, Moral Philosophy and Internal Rhetoric
from Bacon to Whately 41
Part Two. Primary Internal Rhetoric:
Constituting Rhetorical Selves 79
3. The Twentieth Century:
Internal Rhetoric after Freud 81
4. The Construction of Selves
by Internal Rhetoric 108
Conclusion:
The Rhetorical Self and Moral Agency
Notes 139
Works Cited 159
Index 167
This page intentionally left blank
Preface
The Obvious
The biggest leap I take in this book is the title, Internal Rhetorics, by
which I initiate a study of the persuasive techniques we use on our-
selves. The term is intended to be obvious and paradoxical—and,
by the end of the book, complex. Obvious, in that it relates to com-
mon locutions:
I'm trying to talk myself into . . .
I've been arguing with myself all day . . .
I just had to give myself a good talking-to ...
It's only crazy to talk to yourself if you answer back.
Most people talk to themselves.1 The quotations that preface each
chapter illustrate the long-standing prevalence of this idea that people
persuade themselves into moods or actions.2
What we tend to take for granted in common parlance has not
made its way into rhetorical theory in a systematic way, however.
All the writers I discuss in this book are canonical in one sense or
another, and most imply, mention, or discuss the use of persuasion
on oneself—but no one so far has connected the dots. The current
rhetorical community has hardly addressed self-persuasion, even
though talking to oneself is at least as ubiquitous and consequential
as the various social language practices analyzed from a rhetorical
perspective.
So, how do I get from the observation that most of us talk to our-
selves to the concept of "internal rhetoric"? I coin the term precisely
to act as what Kenneth Burke calls a "terministic screen," to call at-
tention to the persuasive or hortatory or sermonic—let's face it, the
rhetorical—nature of much thought. "Internal rhetoric" is thus a lens
through which to study mental activity rather than a reference to a
particular kind of mental activity. By pointing out the rhetorical func-
tion of thought rather than positing a separate genre of thought, I