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Recent Articles in Critical and Cultural Studies
A Study In Sherlock, Rebecca Mclaughlin 
Bridgewater State University
A Study In Sherlock, Rebecca Mclaughlin
Undergraduate Review
In 2010, the BBC launched its newest series, Sherlock. The show was an instant success in the UK, Europe, and the United States. In early 2012, Season Two aired with even greater success. But we might ask why, nearly 120 years after he was first introduced, the character of Sherlock Holmes, along with his companion Dr. John Watson, still captures the attention of TV audiences? My study examines the representation of this fictional male friendship as a popular culture phenomenon both at the turn of the twentieth century and today. Focusing on the representation of domesticity and unmarried men, homosocial ...
"Terrorism" In The Age Of Obama: The Rhetorical Evolution Of President Obama’S Discourse On The "War On Terror", Kelly Long Bridgewater State University
"Terrorism" In The Age Of Obama: The Rhetorical Evolution Of President Obama’S Discourse On The "War On Terror", Kelly Long
Undergraduate Review
Since the events that transpired on the morning of September 11th, 2001, “terrorism” has become a part of the vocabulary of modern American culture. The word “terrorism” has become a powerful ideograph—a word or phrase that is abstract in nature, but has a great deal of ideological power—in American culture. This commonly used abstract word can be heard almost daily in the media and within the larger lexicon of American political discourse. Rhetoricians use the word to describe their motives and persuade audiences to align their ideological principles with those of the larger cause. This study examines how ...
Constructing Texts In Fringe Science: Challenges In Propaedeutics, David M. Berube 
University of Iowa
Constructing Texts In Fringe Science: Challenges In Propaedeutics, David M. Berube
Poroi
This brief article examines the scholarship of propaedeutics, which is involved when teasing meaning from cutting-edge scientific and technological fields that are often in flux. Because these fields are plagued with uncertainty, mired in shifting jargon, highly controversial, and often politicized, the scholar who studies these areas must build texts in order to approach the claims and counterclaims made by proponents and opponents and offer rhetorical critical insight. The term fringe science is used to describe three sub-fields that have been the subject of work by the author and his team. Nanotechnology, synthetic biology, and geo-engineering are three highly interdisciplinary ...
Emerging Directions In Science, Publics, And Controversy, James Wynn, Lynda Walsh University of Iowa
Emerging Directions In Science, Publics, And Controversy, James Wynn, Lynda Walsh
Poroi
This essay discusses the major themes that emerged as part of an Octavian roundtable discussion on the topics of science, publics and controversy at the Association of Rhetoric of Science and Technologies’ (ARST) 2012 Vicentennial preconference. Participants expressed interest in developing research exploring the differing scales and types of scientific controversies and the roles that rhetoricians might play as interveners in public disagreements on techno-scientific issues. Participants also explored the emerging phenomenon—such as the role of the internet in facilitating interaction between lay publics, science, and scientists—that they believed would provide fertile sites of investigation for scholars in ...
Projecting Possible Lines Of Sight For Rsstm, Lawrence J. Prelli, Celeste Condit University of Iowa
Projecting Possible Lines Of Sight For Rsstm, Lawrence J. Prelli, Celeste Condit
Poroi
Scholarship concerning visual representations in science, technology, and medicine is in a preliminary phase. This essay surveys selected areas where visually-oriented rhetorical studies of science, technology and medicine are emerging. It examines the relationships between visual and verbal dimensions of scientific, technical, and medical texts; raises questions concerning the appropriateness of using concepts from the linguistic tradition to analyze visuals; and outlines fruitful areas for further study, ranging from studies of the truth-value of images through public communication about visualizations.
The Rhetoric Of Technology As A Rhetorical Technology, John A. Lynch, William J. Kinsella University of Iowa
The Rhetoric Of Technology As A Rhetorical Technology, John A. Lynch, William J. Kinsella
Poroi
Defining the “rhetoric of technology” encounters the challenges scholars have identified when defining both “rhetoric” and “technology,” and it raises issues about how to demarcate the rhetoric of technology from media studies and other cognate fields. One distinguishing feature of both rhetoric and technology is the focus on invention. Giving priority to invention highlights the liminal positionality of a rhetoric of technology, which lies betwixt and between science and commerce, and novelty and familiarity. Considering invention further encourages interdisciplinary reflexivity about the decisions made in technological development and dissemination.
Genres In Scientific And Technical Rhetoric, Carolyn R. Miller, Jeanne Fahnestock University of Iowa
Genres In Scientific And Technical Rhetoric, Carolyn R. Miller, Jeanne Fahnestock
Poroi
The idea of genre marks large-scale repeated patterns in human symbolic production and interaction, patterns that are taken to be meaningful. Genre thus can be defined by reference to pattern, or form, and by reference to theories of meaning and interaction. This report on a discussion of scientific and technical genres at the 2012 Vicentennial meeting of the Association for the Rhetoric of Science & Technology (ARST) briefly considers the differences and difficulties with different ways of defining genres and their relevance to science and technology, explorations of the ways genres change or evolve, and pedagogical applications of genre analysis in ...
Horizon Myths, Lynda Walsh University of Iowa
Horizon Myths, Lynda Walsh
Poroi
In this short response to the papers in the “Horizons of Possibility” group, I first identify a dialectic between calls to disciplinarity and calls to engagement. Then, instead of offering a transcendent synthesis, I point to two recent narratives suggesting that stakeholders in scientific debates are starting to seek out rhetoricians as resources.
Audiences, Brains, Sustainable Planets, And Communication Technologies: Four Horizons For The Rhetoric Of Science And Technology, Carolyn R. Miller University of Iowa
Audiences, Brains, Sustainable Planets, And Communication Technologies: Four Horizons For The Rhetoric Of Science And Technology, Carolyn R. Miller
Poroi
This response to papers by Leah Ceccarelli, Randy Harris, and Carl Herndl and Lauren Cutlip in the “Horizons of Possibility” panel at the 2012 ARST Vicentennial conference raises questions about each of the visions as they relate, respectively, to ARST audiences, brain science, and sustainable planets and programs. It also suggests renewed attention to communication technologies by scholars studying the rhetoric of science and technology, maintaining that rhetoricians need to come to terms with emerging twenty-first century communicative forms.
Promoting The Discipline: Rhetorical Studies Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Jeanne Fahnestock University of Iowa
Promoting The Discipline: Rhetorical Studies Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Jeanne Fahnestock
Poroi
Condit, Prelli, and Depew and Lyne offer useful taxonomies of scholarship in the rhetoric of science, technology and medicine (RSTM), and once again provoke questions about the distinctiveness of a rhetorical approach. Rhetorical studies examine the choices rhetors make at all levels of invention (e.g., lines of argument, arrangement, terminology, visuals). But rhetoricians have not been clear in defining the distinctive contribution of their approach, and scholars in related fields do not routinely access or acknowledge rhetorical studies. There are also impediments to framing rhetorical studies for scientists and practitioners: the term rhetoric still has negative connotations in science ...
The Productivity Of Scientific Rhetoric, David J. Depew, John Lyne University of Iowa
The Productivity Of Scientific Rhetoric, David J. Depew, John Lyne
Poroi
We argue that the rhetoric of science occupies an important niche in contemporary science studies. Although we are pluralistic about how different rhetoricians of science can and do conduct their inquiries, we assert that their disciplinarily distinctive approach is to treat argumentation as a constituent of context. From this perspective, we observe various interacting forms of rationality at work in the controversies that constitute science in society. We argue that modes of discovery and modes of proof are mutually engaged in the process of rhetorical invention. We identify a variety of topics or commonplaces that show invention as we conceive ...
State Of The Art Twenty Years On: Reflections, John A. Campbell University of Iowa
State Of The Art Twenty Years On: Reflections, John A. Campbell
Poroi
This paper discusses three position papers presented at the vicentennial conference of the Association for the Rhetoric of Science and Technology (ARST) concerning the disciplinary prospects of rhetoric of science and technology as a field. It identifies common themes among the three papers, including a theoretical focus on rhetorical invention, the prospects for viable responses to institutional changes and pressures in the academy, and the possibilities for interdisciplinary and public engagement by rhetoricians of science. It also identifies points of departure among the three papers, including their respective foci on globalization, the place of style in invention, and the interaction ...
Mind The Gaps": Hidden Purposes And Missing Internationalism In Scholarship On The Rhetoric Of Science And Technology In Public Discourse, Celeste M. Condit University of Iowa
The Prospect Of Invention In Rhetorical Studies Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Lawrence J. Prelli University of Iowa
The Prospect Of Invention In Rhetorical Studies Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Lawrence J. Prelli
Poroi
This paper recommends three general lines of inquiry concerning rhetorical invention as alternative ways to advance work in rhetorical studies of science, technology, and medicine. One line of inquiry involves the study of the creative processes and imaginative practices involved in the invention of perspectives in discourses of and about science, technology, and medicine. This line of inquiry is elaborated with attention to the master tropes, dramatism, argument, and visual representations. The second general line of inquiry involves identification, analysis, and critique of the commonplaces that are deployed as authoritative in discourses about purportedly “expert” matters. The third line of ...
Conspectus: Inventing Futures For The Rhetoric Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Lisa Keranen University of Iowa
Conspectus: Inventing Futures For The Rhetoric Of Science, Technology, And Medicine, Lisa Keranen
Poroi
This introduction to the Association for the Rhetoric of Science & Technology’s (ARST) twentieth anniversary special issue of Poroi reflects on the inventional resources for scholarship concerning the rhetoric of science, technology, and medicine (RSTM). After previewing the essays in the special issue, it outlines four questions facing RSTM scholars. These questions concern how to discern the purposes of our scholarship, how to reach the multiple audiences for our work, how to use multiple methods while retaining our rhetorical core, and how to orient our work theoretically. The essay concludes by briefly discussing how these questions present both challenges and ...
Because I Said So: Constructing Identities In Argentina's Dirty War, Danielle N. Olean 
University of New Hampshire
Because I Said So: Constructing Identities In Argentina's Dirty War, Danielle N. Olean
Honors Theses
No abstract provided.
Distinguishing The 'Vanguard' From The 'Insipid': Exploring The Valorization Of Mainstream Popular Music In Online Indie Music Criticism, Charles J. Blazevic 
Western University
Distinguishing The 'Vanguard' From The 'Insipid': Exploring The Valorization Of Mainstream Popular Music In Online Indie Music Criticism, Charles J. Blazevic
University of Western Ontario - Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository
This thesis explores recent transformations in the way mainstream popular music is valorized in online indie music publication Pitchfork. Indie music culture has traditionally defined itself in opposition to mainstream popular taste, through social and aesthetic differentiation mechanisms grounded in connoisseurship and DIY ethics. This thesis argues that the increased popularity and commodification of indie music has altered the culture’s exclusionary taste boundaries, selectively welcoming mainstream performers. To explore these changes, I analyze Pitchfork reviews of albums that appear in the top 20 of the Billboard 200 Year-End Chart, 2006-2011. My findings show that Pitchfork critics tend to privilege ...
Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D. 
E. H. Butler Library at Buffalo State College
Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D.
Michael I Niman Ph.D.
Mike Niman discusses the future of journalism in a PR-dominated communication environment. In particular, he examines the migration of talent from journalism to the PR industry, the collapse of mainstream journalism and the role of an emergent alternative media as American journalism goes through metamorphosis from what it was to what it could become. Journalism is a social good that should equip people to understand and resist spin. Niman argues that mainstream American journalism, rather than rising to this challenge, has transparently succumbed to serving as an arm of the corporate PR industry, thus laying the groundwork for its own ...
The Phenomenon Behind The Bite: Altercasting As It Applies To Apple Technology, Elizabeth Baldwin 
Liberty University
The Phenomenon Behind The Bite: Altercasting As It Applies To Apple Technology, Elizabeth Baldwin
Masters Theses
This paper investigates how the brand Apple markets their product so that consumers feel obligated to buy their product. By looking at five main categories of brand loyalty, environmentally friendly practices, being up-to-date with technology, pricing with value and customer service, this paper will rhetorically analyze how successful of a job it does. To get an inside look at what the public thought on the the way that Apple fulfilled their altercasting this paper analyzed what people said about Apple verses competing technology brands. By drawing overall conclusions, recording trends and making observations about the way that people had been ...
"It's Just That For The First Time, I Feel... Wicked": A Rhetorical Analysis Of Wicked's Elphaba Using Kenneth Burke's Guilt-Purification-Redemption Cycle, Patricia Foreman Liberty University
"It's Just That For The First Time, I Feel... Wicked": A Rhetorical Analysis Of Wicked's Elphaba Using Kenneth Burke's Guilt-Purification-Redemption Cycle, Patricia Foreman
Masters Theses
The purpose of this study was to examine the Broadway production, Wicked, and more specifically, the character of Elphaba, or the Wicked Witch of the West. The study utilized Kenneth Burke's theory of the guilt-purification-redemption cycle, and considered Elphaba's journey between the three steps of Burke's cycle. In order to understand this journey better, the researcher considered various facets of the show, including the script, lyrics, costuming, including attire and make-up, and interactions with other characters in the production. Elphaba's causes of guilt, including her mother's death, her relationship with Glinda, her cause in working ...
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