Abstract
ABSTRACT: This paper underlines the relationship between rhetoric and postmodernism. In lack of (and in spite of) a unique definition, postmodernism is seldom described as a non-centred set of rhetorical, critical and discursive practices; rhetoric offers a fertile frame for the interpretation of postmodernism. In my approach, I analyze both the type of rhetoric through which we can grasp the current of postmodernism (the rhetoric of postmodernism) and the use of rhetoric inside the postmodern discursiveness (postmodern rhetoric). The former was born out of its relationship with modernism and from this standpoint I am interested in investigating the rhetorical relevance of themes such as rupture, continuity, palimpsest, anamnesis, incompleteness. The latter is discussed mainly by focusing on the effects of the repositioning of rhetoric in postmodernism. These analyses create a cluster of motifs that constitute the nucleus of the contemporary rhetoric imaginary.
Highlights
Rhetoric is a discipline whose instruments and strategies have been heavily used in the development of postmodernism, and more than that, the latter built its own rhetoric, one that proved sensitive to its own traits
The passing from a paradigm of language as representation to a paradigm of language as action is a trait of the postmodern condition, so that postmodernism itself had an enormous influence on rhetorical theories (FOSS,S.K.; FOSS, K.A.; TRAP, 2001), and the postmodern authors constituted “[...] a dominant force in their view of the contemporary rhetorical period.” (BROCK; SCOTT; CHESEBO, 1990, p. 430)
The strained and ambiguous relationship that postmodernism has with modernism represents a good opportunity for us to capture the dominant tonality of the postmodern philosophical discourse
Summary
Rhetoric is a discipline whose instruments and strategies have been heavily used in the development of postmodernism, and more than that, the latter built its own rhetoric, one that proved sensitive to its own traits. The strained and ambiguous relationship that postmodernism has with modernism represents a good opportunity for us to capture the dominant tonality of the postmodern philosophical discourse This tonality has to be nuanced in each specific case, for each philosophical approach. The critics of postmodernism considered that the relationship between modernism and postmodernism is depicted within two main paradigms: the paradigm of rupture and the paradigm of continuity Using this idea as a landmark, I shall try to present a few types of rhetoric that are suggestive for each paradigm, and some types that are “suspended” between those two grand perspectives, or even surpass them or amass them into an ironic “meta-rhetoric”. The common places of interpretation will be briefly discussed, the accent being put on proposing new perspectives that are more nuanced
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