Rhetoric, Through Everyday Things

281 Pages·2016·6.059 MB·English

by  Scot Barnett, Casey Boyle (eds.)

RHETORIC,

THROUGH EVERYDAY THINGS
RHETORIC, CULTURE, AND SOCIAL CRITIQUE
Series Editor
John Louis Lucaites
Editorial Board
Jeffrey A. Bennett
Barbara Biesecker
Carole Blair
Joshua Gunn
Robert Hariman
Debra Hawhee
Claire Sisco King
Steven Mailloux
Raymie E. McKerrow
Toby Miller
Phaedra C. Pezzullo
Austin Sarat
Janet Staiger
Barbie Zelizer
RHETORIC
,
THROUGH EVERYDAY THINGS
edited by
SCOT BARNETT & CASEY BOYLE
THE UNIVERSITY OF ALAB AMA PRESS
Tuscaloosa
The University of Alab ama Press
Tuscaloosa, Ala bama 35487- 0380
uapress.ua.edu
Copyright © 2016 by the University of Alab ama Press
All rights reserved.
Inquiries about reproducing material from this work should be addressed to the
University of Ala bama Press.
Typeface: Scala and Scala Sans
Manufactured in the United States of America
Cover design: Michele Myatt Quinn
∞
The paper on which this book is printed meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for
Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48- 1984.
Cataloging- in- Publication data is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN: 978- 0- 8173- 1919- 9
E- ISBN: 978- 0- 8173- 8994- 9
Contents
List of Illustrations vii
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Rhe tori cal Ontology, or, How to Do Things with Things
Scot Barnett and Casey Boyle 1
I. THE NEW ONTOLOGY OF PERSUASION
1. Listening to Strange Strangers, Modifying Dreams
Marilyn M. Cooper 17
2. Implicit Paradigms of Rhetoric: Aristotelian, Cultural, and Heliotropic
John Muckelbauer 30
3. Rendering and Reifying Brain Sex Science
Christa Teston 42
4. Alinea Phenomenology: Cookery as Flat Ontography
Katie Zabrowski 55
II. WRITING THINGS
5. Writing Devices
Donnie Johnson Sackey and William Hart- Davidson 69
6. The Material Culture of Writing: Objects, Habitats, and Identities in Practice
Cydney Alexis 83
7. The Things They Left Behind: Toward an Object- Oriented History of
Composition
Kevin Rutherford and Jason Palmeri 96
8. Object- Oriented Ontology’s Binary Duplication and the Promise of Thing-
Oriented Ontologies
S. Scott Graham 108
III. SEEING THINGS
9. Materiality’s Rhe tori cal Work: The Nineteenth- Century Parlor Stereoscope and
the Second- Naturing of Vision
Kristie S. Fleckenstein 125
10. Circulatory Intensities: Take a Book, Return a Book
Brian J. McNely 139
11. On Rhe tori cal Becoming
Laurie Gries 155
12. So Close, Yet So Far Away: Temporal Pastiche and Dear Photograph
Kim Lacey 171
IV. ASSEMBLING THINGS
13. Assemblage Rhetorics: Creating New Frameworks for Rhe tori cal Action
Jodie Nicotra 185
14. Objects, Material Commonplaces, and the Invention of the “New Woman”
Sarah Hallenbeck 197
15. Encomium of QWERTY
James J. Brown Jr. and Nathaniel A. Rivers 212
Afterword: A Crack in the Cosmic Egg, Tuning into Things
Thomas Rickert 226
Works Cited 233
List of Contributors 255
Index 259
Illustrations
5.1. A network map of how Mike realizes bighead carp’s non/invasive identity 74
5.2. Three patterns of information flow among patients and care providers 80
6.1. Diana’s primary writing site (kitchen) 89
6.2. Diana’s alternative writing site (library/living room) 89
8.1. The two- world of modernity and postmodernity 110
8.2. The four- world of new materialisms 112
9.1. The Holmes- Bates Stereoscope 131
9.2. The Brewster Stereoscope 133
10.1. The Little Free Library placard and credo 139
10.2. Current holdings, Dec emb er 21, 2012 148
10.3. The Little Free Library, looking down Maxwell toward an eagle’s perch 152
10.4. Circulations, disclosures, and attunements in rhe tori cal situatedness 153
11.1. Obama Hope poster 156
11.2. Beacon by OVO 162
11.3. Obama in Ghana bag 162
11.4. Obama for Presidente poster 163
11.5. Obama mural in Los Angeles 164
11.6. Obama Biscuits 166
11.7. PhotoFunia montage of Pimp Obamico 168
11.8. Yes We Scan, Rene Walter 169
12.1. The image that launched Dear Photograph 175
12.2. AT&T Twitter advertisement 176
12.3. Siblings on steps 181
14.1. Pope advertisement, 1885 203
14.2. Damascus Bicycle Company Gentlemen’s Safety Bicycle 205
14.3. Damascus Bicycle Company Ladies’ Safety Bicycle 205
14.4. Damascus Bicycle handlebar options for male and female riders 207
14.5. “The New Woman Wash Day” 209
15.1. Sholes and Glidden Type- Writer 218
15.2. Engelbart’s NLS, featuring the chord keyset, the mouse, and QWERTY 221
Acknowledgments
Any book is a patchwork of voices and interests. This one is no exception. First
and foremost, we thank the contributors to this volume, who each brought tre-
mendous faith, creativity, and patience to a collaborative project. We would also
like to thank the many fine scholars who submitted proposals for the collection
and who have expressed interest and support for the project over the past three
years. Although not necessarily reflected in the table of contents, your voices
and perspectives are present through out these pages in many important ways.
We also extend our gratitude to Byron Hawk and Thomas Rickert, who shared
our interest in this project and provided much feedback in the book’s initial
planning stages.
We would also like to thank the fine staff at the University of Ala bama Press
for their support and careful attention througho ut this book’s vario us stages of
production: Jon Berry, Kristie Henson, John Lucaites, Jonathan Lee Pattishall,
Dan Waterman, and JD Wilson, as well as the anonymous reviewers who of-
fered invaluable feedback.
For the editors, this project’s life has spanned four academic institutions, nu-
merous academic pursuits and publications, and the birth of two children. It is
impossible to do justice to the many people who have supported us professionally
and personally during this time. However, we offer the following in the hopes of
capturing something of the essence of these complex networks we call our lives:
Scot
This project began while I was a new Assistant Professor at Clemson Uni-
versity. While at Clemson, I received tremendous support from my department
chair, Lee Morrissey, as well as my colleagues and friends in the Department
of English: David Blakesley, Erin Goss, Cynthia Haynes, Jan Holmevik, Steve
Katz, Michael LeMahieu, Brian McGrath, Sean Morey, and Victor Vitanza. My
new department at Indiana has been equally supportive. In particular, I thank