A note regarding this post: Aaron and I have delayed our digital correspondence due to and extended debate over this weeks readings and how best to engage questions of historical contextualization in general and in regard to Isocrates specifically. We shall work to recapitulate portions of this discussion in the following posts.
1. Muir attacks educationists saying that none of them have “turned to either the historical evidence or historical scholarship when they made historical pronouncements” (177). This quote is most readily taken as an indict of preceding historical methodologies, arguing that scholars have failed to properly research their claims. However, might we make the weaker argument stronger by defending these educationists, viewing their work through Nietzsche’s ahistorical lens? In brief, can we consider the educationist methodologies positively, asserting that their works have engaged ahistoricity in an effort to avoid the crippling weight of historical contexts? Might educationists have been working to build their own historical narratives that focused on utility over factual accuracy and citation? If so, what is to be gained (or lost) by correcting these (a)historic accounts? Has Muir proven previous histories of education to be inferior, or merely inaccurate?
2. Recent seminar discussions have turned to the realization that viewing Plato and Isocrates as oppositional forces is an unnecessarily maneuver which limits our understanding of their works. These conversations mirror Timmerman’s sentiment where he argues that scholars too often fall into the trap of perceiving philosophy and rhetoric as a zero-sum game (145). In an attempt to deescalate the contest between Isocrates and Plato, how might we best unify their contributions in an effort to better promote paideia? Is Timmerman on the right path by trying to unify “competing” notions of paideia?
3. Much of the reading for this week (and preceding weeks) has identified Isocrates as the loser in the intellectual contest between himself and Plato. However, as Muir and Timmerman illustrate, this declaration of defeat is not entirely accurate when we examine trends in academia and society at large. What has caused this narrative of Platonism’s victory to propagate? What is to be gained by examining the boundaries through which intellectual contests have been declared?
I originally put this in the comment section of the question thread. I am giving it its own thread in keeping with the earlier responses.
I will attempt to answer the question regarding imitation, but perhaps I will suggest some avenues for other considerations that may relate to the other questions.
We see early in the dialogue that Socrates asks Phaedrus to give him the discourse he has just heard at Lysias’ feet. Phaedrus protests: “Do you suppose that I, who am a mere ordinary man, can tell from memory, in a way that is worthy of Lysias, what he, the cleverest writer of our day, composed at his leisure and took a long time for?”
Socrates is suspicious, and says that he if he doesn’t “know [agnow] Phaedrus” he has forgotten himself (228A). Phaedrus is lying. He has heard the speech several times, and he has even taken the speech so as learn it:
“And [you were] going outside the wall to practice [meleton] it.”
Note that our word practice covers two different senses: that practice which is rote action required for memorization or the skilled performance of a task (“practicing piano”) and the realization or doing of something in the world (“a doctor’s practice”). Meletao could be translated as giving one’s attention to something. Phaedrus goes outside of the city walls in order to practice, to attend to the discourse, so as to memorize it. Note that in this time reading silently to oneself was not practiced: all reading was aloud. This shows us 1) that Phaedrus, the student, is ashamed of this effortful practice and 2) that he must leave the polis in order to practice so as not to be heard. Isocrates claim to teach political discourse, or logos politikos (upon which the title of this blog puns) is ridiculed here: in order to remember these discourses on the city, the students leave the city because they are too ashamed to be heard reciting them. Socrates adds insult to injury. When Phaedrus remarks that Socrates seems like a stranger to these parts, Socrates replies “Forgive me, my dear friend. You see, I am fond of learning. Now the country places and the trees won’t teach me anything, and the people in the city do,” (230D).
In Antidosis, Isocrates feels the need to defend melete: “I marvel at men who felicitate those who are eloquent by nature on being blessed with a noble gift, yet rail at those who wish to become eloquent…Pray, what that is noble by nature becomes shameful and base when one attains it be effort [melete]?” (291).
We might also read in the critique of writing throughout the Phaedrus a criticism of Isocrates’ claim to philosophy. Philosophy can only be born in speaking to another, not through reading, and therefore not through imitating a written speech. If Isocrates’ Helen is the target, we have In the Great Speech, Socrates says: “But beauty, as I said before, shone in brilliance among these visions; and since we came to earth we have found it shining most clearly through the clearest of our sense; for sight is the sharpest of the physical senses, though wisdom [phronesis] is not seen by it, for wisdom would arouse terrible love, if such a clear image of it were granted as would come through sight,” (250D). Isocrates’ philosophy cannot teach phronesis since it consists of the memorization of Isocrates’ written orations.
Let us go deeper into the Great Speech. If you will allow me a little speculation, I would like to offer yet another way that Plato mocks Isocrates, again by calling forward imitation. When the follower of Zeus (“the god of friendship”, 234E) is seized by Love, he can handle this “heavier” burden. But the servants of Ares “when they have been seized by Love and think they have been wronged in any way by the beloved, become murderous and are ready to sacrifice themselves and the beloved,” (252c). If we interpret this as an allusion to Isocrates, especially in reference to Helen, we find that Isocrates praises beauty in precisely this way. “What man would have rejected marriage with Helen, at whose abduction the Greeks were as incensed as if all Greece had been laid waste, while the barbarians were as filled with pride as if they had conquered us all?” (49) We see here that Isocrates, in commending the Greek heroes of the Trojan War specifically praises their going to war against the barbarians in order to retrieve beauty, which is of course also his exhortation to his contemporaries. Even more explicitly, he writes at the end of his discourse “it is owing to Helen that we are not slaves to the barbarians…it was because of her that the Greeks became united and organized a common expedition against the barbarians,” (67).
Socrates then says, “And so it is with the follower of each of the other gods [theon]; he lives, so far as he is able, honouring [timon] and imitating that god…and in that way he behaves and conducts himself toward his beloved and towards all others.” Timotheus was Isocrates most beloved student. (The Loeb Classical Library’s introduction tells us that Phaedrus was the favorite pupil of Plato.) If we read here a play on Timotheus’ name, we are even more clued into why Isocrates’ would be a follower of Ares: he has found a beloved who is like his god. “The followers of Zeus desire that soul of him whom they love to be like Zeus; so they seek one of a lordly and philosophical nature,” (252E). We would assume by analogy that the follower of Ares would find one who is warlike. Who better than a general?
“If now the better elements of the mind, which lead to a well ordered life and to philosophy, prevail, they live a life of happiness and harmony here on earth, self-controlled and orderly, holding in subjection that which causes evil in the soul and giving freedom to that which makes virtue; and when this life is ended they are light and winged, for they have conquered in one of the three truly Olympic events. Neither human wisdom [sophrosyne] not divine inspiration can confer upon man any greater blessing than this. If however they live a life less noble and without philosophy, but yet ruled by the love of honor [philotimo], probably, when they have been drinking, or in some other moment of carelessness, the two unruly horses, taking the souls off their guard, will bring them together and seize upon and accomplish that which is by many accounted blissful” (256C). If this is an allusion to Isocrates, could it be that here Plato is saying that Isocrates and Timotheus were lovers? he goes on to say that these lovers, going through life as friends, are not ‘winged’ upon death, but nonetheless their “madness of love brings them no small reward…but [they] shall live a happy life in the light as they journey together, and because of their love shall be alike in their plumage when they receive their wings.”
If my speculation is right, this might help to explain the defense of Timotheus in Antidosis. Isocrates says that his “accuser has mentioned…the friendship which existed between me an Timotheus, and has attempted to calumniate [them] both, nor did any sense of shame restrain him from saying slanderous and utterly infamous things about a man who is dead ” (101-2). This could not be simply that he is a traitor: Timotheus was publicly put on trial for this, so this would already be well known. If we take the Antidosis as a response to Plato, this slander might well be what I have just mentioned.
If we take up the question of how the three discourses correspond to Isocrates, I would put it like this. the first speech is related to Gorgias’ Encomium of Helen, the second speech is related to Isocrates’ Helen, and the Great Speech is Plato’s. Since I have already gone on too long, I will confine my remarks here to the second speech. But to defend this argument, I will first say that there is at least one allusion to Gorgias’ Helen: When Plato says that all writing is “playful” and none “deserves to be treated very seriously” (277E), he is repeating Gorgias’ line at the end of his Encomium on Helen, that writing is a play-thing, not something to imitate again and again in order to learn something from it. And recall that Isocrates is thought to be a student of Gorgias–that he takes up writing so seriously, and particularly on the theme of Helen and beauty, shows him to be ridiculous.
The second speech is both a mockery of Isocrates and is in some ways in his style. The speaker says that there are “two ruling and leading principles” in everyone: “desire for pleasure, and an acquired opinion [doxa] which strives for the best” (237D).Isocrates had placed these in contrast much earlier in Against the Sophists (21) where he says one should seek a good reputation [εὐδοκιμήσεις] over pleasure and gain (as well as pain and temper). That was written around 392 BCE, while the Phaedrus was written in 370 BCE. Given that it was Against the Sophists in which Isocrates sought to put forward the principles of his educational system and sought to distinguish them from other sophists, I think it is fair to say that these opposed principles would have been recognizable as Isocratean.
He will “court a beloved who is effeminate, not virile” (239C). Compare this to Antidosis, when Isocrates notes that Timotheus was unlike other generals in that he “lacks a robust physique” (115). Socrates then says “A person of such a body, in war and in all important crises, gives courage to his enemies, and gills his friends, and even his lovers themselves, with fear,” (239D). It seems strange to bring up war here–unless of course we assume that Plato is alluding to Timotheus. This is indeed a grave insult–through Isocrates courting of this effeminate man who has become a general, he has harmed Athens by emboldening her enemies. The speech goes on to sat that the lover “”is forced to run after him [the beloved] in anger and with imprecations” (241B). We also know that Isocrates is said to have accompanied Timotheus on some of his expeditions as a kind of scribe or secretary, giving up his teaching for that period.
(As an aside, it is curious that Howland should say that definition is what is key for the “clear thinking”shown in the Great Speech (156-7), since we see a definition of love at the beginning of the second speech: “let us first agree on a definition of love” (237D).)
What is of great interest, I think, is that both Plato and Isocrates invoke the recantation of Stesichoros. But as Plato points out, this recantation is a denial of the Homeric epics: “That saying is not true, thou didst not go within the well-oared ships, nor didst thou come to the walls of Troy” (243B). Isocrates doesn’t quote the recantation in Helen, but only mentions it to show Helen’s power–she blinded those who insulted her (64-5). If Stesichoros’ recantation is taken as evidence of Helen’s nature, then it would undermine the whole of Isocrates discourse, since it relies upon the Homeric epics and the story of the Trojan War.
We must move past Homer’s Helen–wash the brine out of our ears–and avoid hexameters.
1) Howland situates his commentary of the early part of the “Phaedrus” around the Isocratic model of imitation. He states, “The teacher of rhetoric, therefore, must be able to practice what he preaches and to show his pupil how it should be done” (153). Now, taking Socrates to be a “teacher of rhetoric” in the “Phaedrus”, and returning to the discussion of episteme from last week, in your judgment, how does Socrates’ ability to imitate easily Lysias’ speech and to produce his own “fair copy” speak to his own system of knowledge concerning rhetoric?
2) After a lengthy discussion of what might constitute a “noble” or “good” rhetoric, a perhaps exhausted Phaedrus admits, “Your project seems excellent, Socrates, if only one could carry it out” (274a). Socrates responds that to strive for what is good is reason enough to pursue the ambitious type of rhetoric he’s outlined. But as soon as the question of practicality is broached, the dialogue shifts topics from speech to writing. In your judgment, how does Socrates’ conception of the good rhetoric accord with previous Isocratic criticisms of rhetorical teaching and Socratic philosophy? How might Isocrates view the Socratic response to Phaedrus’s unease and account for practicality?
3) This question might take some interpretive muscle. The “Phaedrus” features three displays of oratory, each building into the next. The first is Lysias’ own oratorical exercise that Phaedrus is keen to practice. The second is Socrates’ seemingly disingenuous pass at a Lysias-type assessment of love. And, finally, the third is Socrates’ shame-induced account of love. In your judgment, and drawing from any of the Isocratic pieces we’ve discussed in seminar, how might we position Isocrates into each of the three speeches of the “Phaedrus”? For instance, does Isocratic pedagogy and rhetorical theory align at all with Socrates’ project in the two speeches that follow Lysias’ speech?
1. We have read several instances of Isocrates employing a device whereby he explains how he will be willing to accept blame if his discourse fails. We have also heard him say in the Panathenaicus that he receives praise for how well his students speak, which he believes has less to do with him than them, but no credit for their good deeds.
In Antidosis, we read: “For I ask you if it turns out that Timotheus was a bad man, and committed many wrongs against you–I ask you to be allowed to share the blame, to pay the penalty, and to suffer whatever is meted out to the guilty; but if, on the other hand, it is shown that he was both a good citizen and a greater general than any other within our knowledge, …you should pass whatever judgment you deem fair [di’kaion] in the light of what I, myself, have done.” (s. 106, p. 245).
What should we make of this device, and specifically how it is employed here: offering a criterion for blame, but leaving judgments of praise to the audience?
2. We learn that Timotheus did not “have a robust physique” (115). Given what else we have read from Isocrates, particularly his attitude towards the training Sparta offers to young men in Panathenaicus, what should we make of the place for gymnastics or exercise in his educational philosophy?
3. Timotheus made those with robust bodies his subordinates, while he had the knowledge [phro’nimon] necessary for a good general (s. 117, p.251). Note that this knowledge, phronesis, is of a different order than that prescribed by Plato in the Republic for the philosohper-king: knowledge as episteme. How does phronesis relate to the “second quality of a good general” “to organize and employ [an army] to good advantage,” (s. 119, p. 253)? Does it have any analogue to rhetoric?
Sarah’s second question is a harder question to answer than it at first appears. The reader would have to be forgiven should they, with scarcely a moment’s thought, answer that Isocrates’ panhellenic project depends to a great extent, perhaps even wholly, upon the existence of a threatening Persian other, the barbaroi he keeps mentioning. Yet the reader has committed a gross sin of taking as given then assumptions present now. Because we live in a world demarcated by nation states divided roughly by ethnic grouping, we tend to take as given that the ancient Greek world was striving forward in history towards this end point and that, inevitably, there was a proto-unified Greek people waiting and willing to form a united Greek state. This is an important supposition, because the idea that the Persian’s are the oriental other which pose an existential threat to Greekness, and thus serve to define by negation what Greekness is, simply does not bear close examination. It is true that the Persian menace was Isocrates’ call’s raison d’être, but that it is at the heart of his plea for unification does not make it the force behind it because, were it, he would never have needed to articulate it. The Persian menace was already present, he did not need to instill it in his audience through his rhetoric. What was lacking was Greek unity, and the only force he had with which to instill such unity was logos. We’ll look at this by first bringing in a bit of outside reading with Herodotus’ Histories, then we’ll look at the Panegyricus, and finally his To Phillip.
The very first work of history that we have left, Herodotus’ Histories (literally means inquiries) is devoted to the project of tracing the enmity of Greeks and Persians. He gives out the common myths quickly and gives the Persian side of things (it all began with the Greeks for sacking Troy over a mere woman who ran off willingly), but then in 5.3 has had enough: “I for my part concerning those stories as being thus [the way the various sides told them] I will not go into, nor if they happened somehow otherwise, [because] I myself know the foremost beginning of the unjust deeds against the Greeks.” The Greek and Persian conflict is the lynchpin connecting all his history together and he devotes attention and detail to as many sides as he can. Were any orientalism operating in Greece as a means of unifying the population into one great political whole we’d expect to see it here, but we don’t. The Persians are certainly cast in opposition to the Greeks, including in a story about how they chose their form of government (3.80-87), and they are without doubt “the other” but the only defining contrast one can draw about the Greeks from their Persian empire is that the Greeks represent freedom while the Persians bondage. If the Persians were that hated other, Sparta would hardly have been able to negotiate, and then blithely ignore, a treaty, the Peace of Antalcidas, granting the Persians overlordship of Greece.
Thus the Persian’s as an oriental force are a force in opposition to the great panhellenic project. They represent the undesirability of unification, as unification of the diverse peoples of Persia meant surrender of freedom. Indeed, Xerxes’ demand of surrender from the Greeks was proffered in just such a spirit, surrender to the Persians and become at last a united people under their benevolent rule. This offer was not tongue in cheek either. Herodotus gives a multitude of examples of conquered monarchs and people faring incredibly well under enlightened Persian leadership. But such well being is not enough, the principal of freedom against Persian bondage is too important to sacrifice just for unity and well being.
Clearly, then, the Persian threat cannot be a force for unification because the existential threat they pose is one of bondage over slavery and, were the city states to surrender their freedom to ward off the threat of slavery, they’d have gotten rid of the one concept that made them what they were. Thus Isocrates has to use something else as his force for unification, and dangle an attack on the Persians as a tempting reward once that unification is complete. And he does. Where no such unity exists, he must create one, with words. And he does. In the Panegyricus Greece lies torn between Athens and Sparta and in sections 16-17 he deftly assumes on behalf of the audience that the best outcome is for the two to split supremacy. This, right here, is the force by which he tries to craft unity. Should the audience accept his assumption that Sparta and Athens are sparring over supremacy than underlying that claim is the presupposition that there is a thing called Greece to be supreme over (well, not always a land called Greece. The Greeks, when they described their land, often called it “the land of the Helenes” rather than the proper noun which was still relatively new in the language, for instance Hellas never appears in Homer. A telling point about the difficulty of getting an audience to accept a unified Greece).
Well, I say supreme as the translation does, but in point of fact, he uses the word hegemon, which simply means leader or leadership, and harkens back to the origins of the panhellenic dream in the alliance of the Delian League set up against the Persians. In the Greek way of viewing the world, one could have a hegemon without surrendering your own state and allegiance to them (see, for instance, the trouble King of Kings Agamemnon has with even the pettiest little kinglets and chieftans in The Illiad). Yet Isocrates has subtly altered the valence of the word, for instance his use of it in On The Peace, he sketches out a plan for Athens to become hegemon through moral leadership. Thus hegemon has ceased to mean being the leader who orders the others along so much as being the leading light which guides the way.
This is an important change, because it allows him to stop attempting to use the force of his words to effect unity from within and allows him to force it from without. In To Philip, Isocrates has abandoned the hope for any kind of Greek led unity, and must look to hellenized barbarians (the Macedonians were barbarians just as much as the Persians, after all) for it in section 38: “And you see how utterly wretched these states have become because of their warfare, and how like they are to men engaged in a personal encounter; . . . after they have punished each other badly, they need no mediator, but separate of their own accord. And that is just what I think these states will do unless you first take them in hand.” The trick here is, surprise surprise, the same as the trick in the Panegryicus. Isocrates sneaks in an underlying assumption that there is a Greek unity for Philip to preserve and that, if he does nothing, it will separate. The word “separate” used by Isocrates is diestesan from diistemi and means literally “stand across,” and is often used (by Herodotus, for instance) to describe the breaking apart of a group into separate warring factions. This, by the way, is a good example of rhetorical eloquence in prose, where Isocrates makes one word in a metaphor do double duty, and it is very convincing. Phillip and Phillip’s son Alexander took Isocrates at his word and made Greek unity an actual fact, alas as just one part of an empire. Still, Isocrates’ rhetoric worked!
It is logos, word, that is the force behind the panhellenic project, because there is no other force available that is acceptable. Notice that he doesn’t ask Phillip to come in and set up an empire, he wants Phillip to set up the leadership that the Greek states can’t provide themselves. Yes, he is taking direct aim at the Persians and using them as his bogeyman, but they aren’t the force behind Greek unification because first and foremost you need a self before you can define it against the other. It is the other way around, the other doesn’t call the self into being but the realization that there is a self distinct from others calls into existence self serving binaries. The Greeks of this time were still in the first part of this ego-forming mirror stage, and Isocrates was using the only tool he had, words, to break them out of it.
1) “Panegyricus” and “On the Peace” both evince Isocrates’s noble striving toward the Panhellenic ideal, yet the two compositions strike very different tones – “Panegyricus’s” “hopeful exaltation” (T. Poulakos 91) is entirely missing from “On the Peace.” In your view, what are the key substantive differences between “Panegyricus” and “On the Peace”, and what is your sense of what is at stake in these differences?
2) Based on his compositions that we read this week (“Panegyricus”, “Address to Philip”, “To Philip “I, “To Philip I”I, and “On the Peace”), to what extent do you think Isocrates’s Panhellenic project relies on the spectre of the other (particularly the Persians) as its uniting force?
3) On page 260-1 of “To Philip”, Isocrates explains that there is “a great difference in persuasiveness” between writing and speaking. In your judgment, what are the gains and losses of spoken versus written discourse, particularly in the realm of politics?
1: In Nicolcles, Isocrates puts eloquence, meaning rhetorical eloquence, in the same category as he puts “wealth and strength and courage” in that they are all good things with which one can do injustices. Yet, unlike wealth, strength, or courage eloquence in speaking has a greater ability with which to do good in that it can constitute what that good is in an audience. In your judgement does Isocrates adequately address Plato’s complaints that rhetoric is inherently amoral with his “with great power comes great responsibility” schtick, or is he sidestepping the question? Is the fact that Isocrates is writing about the power of rhetoric to instill “the good” in an audience to an audience which he hopes will buy into his notion that rhetoric is good the greatest argument in his favor or the most damning example rhetoric’s insidious nature?
2: The epilogue (or peroration if you’d prefer the latin term) of To Nicocles acknowledges the somewhat banal nature of all the preceding advice, but puts it in the terms of eating one’s veggies instead of just gorging in desert. There seems to be a tacit acknowledgement of Plato’s criticism of rhetoric being to politics as the fatty desert is to healthy cooking, especially as this is an explicitly political text. Evagoras is not quite so obviously a political text (yet nor is it an apolitical text) so, in your judgement, is Evagoras, with it’s distancing of prose rhetoric from poetry’s embellishments, performing this same acknowledgement? Is Isocrates attempting to run away from rhetorical tradition, which reveled in style over substance? How does this square with Nicocles’ praising of eloquence?
3: Ah, irony. Isocrates’ dream was a united Greece to go forth and vanquish the barbarians (mostly the Persians, but any barbarians would do) and wrote with the aim of furthering this dream. Hence his arguments about the power and responsibility of logos. Yet, it was not any student or letter recipient of his that made this dream come somewhat true, but a young student of a teacher from the rival academy (Alexander taught by Aristotle) who united Greece and then went on to Hellenize a good chunk of the world. In your judgement, considering the readings from this week and all the readings prior, does this mean Isocrates failed in his attempt to shape a unified audience or succeeded? Keep in mind that while Greece never again became a world power, its culture, especially its culture as defined by Athenian writers such as Isocrates, continues to have huge weight even today, e.g. this class.
In the Graduate Seminar on September 24, 2013, we’ll be discussing the following readings:
• Isocrates, Against the Sophists, Busiris.
• Goodwin F. Berquist, Jr., “Isocrates of Athens: Foremost Speech Teacher of the Ancient World,” The Speech Teacher 8 (1959): 251-55.
• Ekaterina Haskins, “Between Kairos and Genre” (Chapter 3) in Haskins, Logos and Power, 57-79.
• R. Johnson, “A Note on the Number of Isocrates’ Pupils,” American Journal of Philology 78 (1957): 297-300.
• Niall Livingstone, “Introduction” (Chapter 1) in Livingstone, A Commentary on Isocrates’ Busiris(Leiden: Brill, 2001), 1-90.
• William L. Benoit, “Isocrates on Rhetorical Education,” Communication Education 33 (1984): 109-119.
Please help us focus our seminar discussion by voting in the poll below the following proposed questions:
1. Separation Through negation: Isocrates spends good portions of “Against the Sophists” and “Bursiris” bashing his competitors for either being too lofty and forward looking or too accessible without experience and intelligence. In your judgement, by attacking others’ educational praxis does Isocrates create a stable foundation for his own academy? In other words, if you were a contemporary of Isocrates would this piece sway you to attend his academy? Is it possible to define his educational system through negation? Is this problematic? As per Livingstone’s argument of “Busiris” presenting Isocrates’ teaching style, what lessons can we learn about Isocratean values?
2. “Bougie” Isocrates: In your judgement, does Isocrates’ privileged socio-economic position constrain the ways in which he is able to produce philosophical work pertaining to rhetorics ability to “render service” (101) to the state? (In “Busiris” 221, Isocrates argues that Polycrates is limited in his philosophical scope and denigrates his character by speaking negatively of his mercantilistic nature, and in “Against the Sophists,” Isocrates mocks the cheapness of the Sophists’ ability to teach, etc.). Is it problematic to assert that Isocrates is “the father of culture” (McGee), in light of his privileged Athenian background? How does his fourth principle (Berquist, p. 254) of a patriotic academic morality of oratory, of a superior “Greek Culture,” fit into potential limits of his teachings? Does the otherness in which Barbarians are portrayed signal a need to be more skeptical of his work? Please provide a justification for your response either way.
3. Contemporary lessons: In your judgement, what lessons can be taken from “Against the Sophists” and “Bursiris” that can be useful in a contemporary academic setting? How can criticisms of other teachers’ methodological practices inform contemporary discussions of a value of a liberal education? How can Isocrates, from who Benoit extracts a working definition of rhetoric, benefit contemporary orators in their public speaking?
On April 16, we’ll be discussing the following readings:
• Ekaterina Haskins, “Classical Rhetorics and the Future of Democratic Education” (Chapter 6) in Logos and Power, 130-136.
• Robert Hariman, “Civic Education, Classical Imitation, and Democratic Polity” (Chapter 9) in Isocrates and Civic Education, 217-234.
• Michael Leff, “Isocrates, Tradition, and the Rhetorical Version of Civic Education” (Chapter 10) in Isocrates and Civic Education, 235-254.
• Kathleen E. Welch, “An Isocratic Literary Theory: An Alternative Rhetoric of Oral/Aural Articulation” (Chapter 2) in Welch, Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1999), 29-75.
Please help us select a question to highlight by voting in the poll below:
Question A – Between Hariman and Welch
Hariman opens his article by bemoaning the “near-complete abandonment of classical texts as a source for civic education,” quickly pointing out that, “these pedagogical changes are the result of cultural forces that are generally progressive, and those proponents of classical study who align it with reactionary politics, class-restrictive education, or Tory manners do no one any favor” (217).Welch seems to be in diametrical disagreement.She consistently chastises Isocrates for his elitist, classist, misogynistic, and imperialistic tendencies and attempts to purge them from the modern Isocratic program.Additionally, she condemns those who appeal to the canonicity of Whiteness and Maleness (cf.62-63), which would seem to include Hariman and his call to hold up classical texts as the models for Isocratic imitation by modern students (223).However, their ultimate applications of Isocrates and his theories are not quite as obviously opposed as their pedagogical predispositions.
Given this, in your judgment, are Hariman and Welch irreconcilable?If so, is one of them correct?Is it ideal to strip Isocrates of his supposedly negative traits?If we do, is there anything useful and distinctly Isocratic left?If we can reconcile them, what might we gain by putting the two into conversation with one another?What might we learn about how ideological commitments can obscure shared pedagogical goals in the contemporary academy?Can Isocrates himself offer a solution?
Question B on the Foundations of Isocratic Stability
A quandary runs throughout Leff’s summarizing article at the end of Isocrates and Civic Education.Not wanting to associate Isocrates with the problematic stances of relativism on the one hand, or absolutism on the other, the question of just where Isocrates grounds the principles of his pedagogical/rhetorical theory arises.At various points in the essay, Leff suggests, or shows how others suggest, that these principles are grounded in the community (237, 241), tradition (242, 246), and/or aesthetics and performance (252).However, Leff also points out how these accounts fall prey to charges of paradox or circularity (241,247,249,253).
Given this, and in light of the virtue claims we have read and discussed in Isocrates’ primary works thus far, in your judgment, whence does Isocrates ground his conceptions of virtue?Is it in one of the candidates that Leff discusses?If so, how can it escape the paradox/circularity charge?If not, does Isocrates point to another source, one that escapes paradox/circularity but still places him between relativism and absolutism?(Or, do you reject that his conceptions are grounded at all, or conversely accept that he is an absolutist?) Ultimately, how does the issue of his grounding affect contemporary attempts to appropriate Isocratic theory?
Question C on What’s Missing
The authors we read for this week offer various prospects for the application of Isocrates in the modern academy.Haskins and Welch see an Isocratic pedagogy, stripped of its elitism, which guides students of all types in a process of critical reflection about themselves and their society.Hariman argues for the appropriation of the Isocratic pedagogical practice of imitation as a vehicle for learning from classical models in general and aimed at generating a global ecological concordance in particular.Leff suggests that the appropriation of Isocratic pedagogy might reintroduce the values of aesthetics and performance into the research academy (although not without complications).None of these is the only option for contemporary appropriation or else they would all be saying the same thing.
In your judgment, what important thread(s) of Isocratic thought have been omitted, neglected, marginalized, etc.?Why, in the context of the other visions of an Isocratic future we have encountered this week, is this omission important to bring to light?
Extra Coolness Points
If Borgias can work the concept of Truth into the selected response.
Borgias responds to the top vote-getting question (Question “C” on “What’s Missing?”)
Last week in the seminar we discussed two concepts in great detail: the intentional fallacy and the usefulness of Isocrates. How pleased I am, then, to see that this week’s reading readdresses the concerns I had about Joe’s claim that Isocrates used philosophy and rhetoric in ways that were “useful” for Isocrates. For those that did not join the discussion, my complaint was two-fold. One part was addressing Diotima’s invocation of the forever-living text. The other was the ends towards which Isocrates aimed his own work. Since I did not come off clearly in seminar, I will take this (water-clock-less) moment to clarify my thoughts on Isocrates’ aims.
If Joe says “Isocrates did what was useful,” my question is merely, “Why was it useful, and did it turn out to be so for Isocrates?” My dark portrait of Isocrates (see the previous post comments if you missed it) appears to claim Isocrates was not successful in any of his stated aims, either to influence political change directly, or to influence political change by influencing his students to take part in civic action.
Last week, we did not receive a very good answer: Isocrates’ success can only be addressed by viewing his longevity in tradition. So, since it’s been brought up, I’ll ask again, perhaps in clearer language: If Isocrates was creating a useful system of rhetoric and philosophy, what did Isocrates want to do with it? Did it “work” for him?
And, in my judgment, the question begins to be answered when we turn to page 221 of Hariman’s Civic Education, Classical Imitation, and Democratic Polity, where Hariman, quoting Michael Cahn, claims that the problem Isocrates undertakes in Against the Sophists is a professional crisis in rhetoric.
While we can use Isocrates as we will, and find more or less or equal worth in him compared to the latest “How to succeed in business and life” self-help book, we are still responsible for reading his texts with the historical factuality that we have: Isocrates was a professional teacher. How did that bear on his writings?
In a round-about way, that’s my personal judgment about what threads we in the class have left out. I expect that some of the rest of the viewers of this blog have other opinions on the matter, and so I invite you to respond with your own opinions, and not necessarily in conversation with this particular thread of thought, as there are so many possible avenues of exploration.
Having briefly dispensed with the Question C, demanded by the crowd, I feel an obligation to turn to the question the seminarians (I assume) chose by the deadline last Thursday, Question A. Though these voters have since been overthrown by the hoi polloi en masse, I think the question still has merit. Once more—and then I swear I’ll drop the subject for a bit—this relates to the question of what we read Isocrates for, what use we have for him. Is our use for him that we are hoping to set the historical record straight, as we saw suggested in last week’s readings, or is it to find a response to our contemporary pedagogical woes by finding ideas about education that were useful to Isocrates and might be applicable to us? These questions are central to Welch’s interest in Isocrates, by the way, and she does an excellent job of outlining her concerns on page 44, but I doubt that the class is in total agreement with her conclusions.
Chaerephon claims that Welch and Hariman seem to be in diametrical disagreement, but I don’t see such strong animosity. Hariman sees inventive imitation as a way to join together disparate groups towards common goals that will aid not just humanity, but the world generally. “Democratic speech developed by imitating the many voices of a pluralistic society presents any speaker with a wide range of resources for addressing a continually unfolding set of unpredictable circumstances,” says Hariman on page 229. While Welch realizes the damaging divisiveness inherent in classical canonicity—who is there for the continuously marginalized to imitate, after all?—Hariman is advocating that we pool our resources against a common enemy (general planetary collapse) as a way to negotiate our internal strife of the sort Welch is concerned with. Hariman’s response to the “tenacity of gender obliviousness and race construction (Welch, 44)” would be that “Isocratean imitation is a creative process determined ultimately by the inventiveness of the speaker and the sophistication of the public audience, not by fidelity to the original form. (230)”
Finally, Hariman recognizes the danger of a “totalizing discourse” arising from inventive imitation. He responds in a footnote that “all political decisions are grounded in discursive performances that can provide the stylistic coherence needed to bind people together for collective action.”
We finally see in this week’s readings the continuation of the discussion started during our reading of Areopagiticus. If you recall, I asked a very similar question of Wandering Sophist, and Chaerephon responded by saying:
Especially in response to the first clause “Can these two competing concerns…discord amongst groups of power within Athens…[and] peace across Greece…ever be resolved independent of each other?” As W.S. skillfully points out, the answer is doubtlessly and unequivocally, no: “Isocrates’ invocation of his audience is not divisive, and allows for the conditions of possibility for pan-Hellenic unity as long as the domestic affairs of Athens are resolved.”
So, for the expert opinion, I look forward to hearing if Wandering Sophist has new thoughts on the subject, given the greater intellectual resources at hand.
My own judgment, in light of the suggestions and warnings Hariman brings up, is that the threat of self-destruction continuously calls for us to set aside our individual concerns and to dwell on the commonalities we share as humans with language (even if we have outgrown the distinction between Greek/Barbarian and recognized the capabilities and limitations inherent in all languages). Perhaps through bonding in an effort to fight a common foe, our differences will have a better chance for resolution.
Finally, I was very much interested in Question B, but I had no solid answer for it. Though the masses seem to have entirely ignored it, I wonder whether respondents to this blog might go some way towards outlining Isocrates’ conception of virtue in light of the concerns Leff points out.
Performative complement
My performance, as some have noticed, was to load the vote. I will also confess that I was behind the comment posted last week with such aplomb. Below are explanations for these trickeries.
At the beginning of the semester, we held onto a few threads of identity in speech compared to writing. Once again, we are faced with a situation—the blog—where the person is detached from their words. This allows us to call and to imagine an audience. The audience invoked by most academic forays into the blogosphere is either that we are reaching out to fellow scholars, or that some random person in the world will search for Isocrates and connect with our community.
In some respects, this is terribly exciting. But I do not know that making intellectual discourse physically available to the wider world does anything to decrease the other boundaries inherent in intellectual participation. I am not so sure we can agree with Welch that Isocrates offers us a fully class-less system. Sure, folks might have their native abilities, and Isocrates may have risen from impoverished heights, but to be his student and take part in the intellectual elite, you are automatically assuming wealth. You are also assuming the luxuries of time and idleness.
It is easy to assume, with the widening world of digital communications, that inclusion is assured for all who seek it. If we put our academic world online for publics to find it, those who want intellectual stimulation will find it, and the ass-ish masses will sink to the bottoms of the Ethernets.
Unfortunately, the luxury implicitly built into the university system in which we operate today is still alive and relevant when we move it to the digital realm. Why else would we have, as our lone real comment (still pending in the queue), “TL;DR”? And, if we have not spoken to the polis—until changing the structure of responses to provide a safe space for “trolls” (and perhaps, further down the road, casual lurkers interested in contributing)—outside of the brief meme-like blurbs passed along via YouTube, does the democratic function of the poll matter at all? Does anything change if public opinions and considerations never appear in this blog?
Last week, JP claimed that we could not fault Isocrates for failing to convince his audience: the masses are asses, and some ideas cannot speak to the time they are in. However, looking at both the enormous problems we encounter every moment of our readings, and the immense luxury we find ourselves in, sitting in the Cathedral, for hours of luxurious discourse at a stretch, can we afford to ignore the hoi polloi, our audience and the agents of civic change, even as we pander to them with our brand-new technologically inclusive blog?
Was Isocrates really complex enough to understand and speak about all four forms of philosophia as defined by Livingstone and Timmerman? If so, how did every author between Isocrates and these gentlemen misunderstand the third definition, the philosophia which “belongs par excellence, if not exclusively to Isocrates himself.” (Livingstone 25) In your judgment, have the authors really found something new, and do you agree that there is evidence to support Isocrates idea of philosophiapar excellence; or is this an acute case of misunderstanding disoi logoi?
Question 2: Isocrates the complex
True, Isocrates was a complex guy. Yet, an identity debate spanning centuries may be a bit drawn-out. Timmerman’s case that Isocrates was never a rhetor fits well into our previous discussions. We have surveyed the many reasons that Isocrates did not want to speak in public, and why he was moved to utilize writing to communicate his ideas. Marrou suggests that “it remains true that there was nothing of the philosopher about him in the sense in which the world has been understood ever since Plato’s time”. (Timmerman, 157). Timmerman therefore concludes that Isocrates’ “use of philosophia [is] not rhetoric by another name, but a contrasting definition of philosophy.” (ibid). Taking the argument further, Muir charges that the entire school of philosophy of education is wrong because they do not pay homage to legacy of Isocrates as a philosopher. In your judgment, are these authors pulling at straws, or is there really a difference between Isocrates as the rhetor and Isocrates as the philosopher? Are the implications of his classification the same as they would have been in ancient Athens, and is it our place to determine where he should be accounted?
Question 3: Isocrates the forgotten
All of history is wrong; Isocrates was the greatest philosopher of all time, the evil underling Plato usurped his glory, and future sophists were tricked into continuing the insult. Where does that leave us? Muir frames the debate as “Historians vs. the Educationists” and concludes that our educational philosophy is mostly wrong. However, his analogies seem flawed. For example, Hirst’s misunderstanding of history is analogized to “American politics in the 1960’s written by someone unaware that there had been a war in Vietnam” (Muir, 189). There are a couple hundred years between Hirst and Isocrates that might account for the oversight. In spite of poor analogy making; in your judgment, is Muir’s argument “ Isocrates’s educational thought is widely influential today precisely because his text are not studied while his ideas…have been inherited indirectly and in fragmented form from others” (Muir, 188) sound, and if so, what are the implications of rediscovering Isocrates?
Joe responds to the question recieving the most votes “Isocrates par Excellence”
Livingstone’s analysis of Isocrates’ use of philosophia explicates four distinct interpretations of the term: 1) progress and self-improvement (24); 2) diverse intellectual and educational practices (24); 3) logoi politikoi (25); and 4) the search for truth (33). In her question, Allibunga wonders whether Isocrates was “complex enough” to address these four forms. Given the intricate depth of the texts he produced, such as the epilogue in thePanathenaicus that uses an “internal audience” approach or his treatment of beauty and its relationship to Athenian culture in the Helen, one would be confusing practicality with simplicity by arguing against Isocrates’ complexity. As Livingstone reminds us, “We must equally avoid the mistake of assuming that what is not systematic is therefore haphazard or unsophisticated” (17). Scholars have been discussing the breadth and depth of his work for centuries and, as evidence by our class, the examination and interpretation of his corpus continues today, indicating only a superficial or naïve reading of his work would suggest he wasn’t well aware of his use of philosophia; unless, of course, the question itself is anachronistic.
A running theme throughout the Livingstone, Timmerman, and Muir articles, anachronism may be an underlying reason why logoi politikoi has been so misunderstood and continues to haunt his work. Livingstone argues one ought not read contemporary perspectives and categories into earlier periods, inevitably losing sight of the historical context (16). Timmerman similarly posits, “This confusion and resultant devaluation of Isocrates’ philosophy is predicated on a platonically colored view of what constitutes philosophy.” (147). We must resist the urge to treat philosophy as a fixed term, but instead acknowledge Isocrates’ work as “predisciplinary” (Timmerman, 153), lest we continue to view his ideas through contemporary paradigms. We must not only attempt to take Isocrates in his own historic context, but we must also attempt to see the way in which our situation (and the situations of those writing about Isocrates) affects interpretation.
Aside from anachronism, another reason why logoi politikoi has been misunderstood concerns the fact that, as Muir vehemently points out, Isocrates has been either misappropriated or completely ignored (166). Muir notes the continuous use of Isocrates’ pedagogy throughout history (168, 180-183), but the literature produced within the last century has obscured Isocrates’ influence, thus obfuscating our view. Perhaps his concern with doxa, rather than episteme, has affected his overall reception, especially considering the intellectual project set forth in the Enlightenment. In addition, translation choices, such as labeling Isocrates’ approach as inherently concerned with “rhetoric” even though he denies it is (Timmerman, 146-147), have likely affected how Isocrates is read. Nonetheless, his spirited pedagogy has been carried forth, albeit detached from their source (Muir, 188).
Stepping back from the forms of philosophia and the misunderstanding of logoi politikoi, Allibunga asks whether or not the authors have “found something new.” To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what is meant by “something new.” I see at least two interpretations: either a previously unaddressed aspect of Isocrates’ work or a new way of approaching philosophy. If the former, it might be possible, but given Muir’s analysis of educational theorists narrow-mindedness and unwillingness to see the presence of Isocrates (either implicit or explicit) throughout history, then I doubt they found anything “new,” just something new for us. If it is the latter, I am still unconvinced. The Romans carried on with some of Isocrates ideas, although it was limited to a representative, aristocratic Republic rather than a radical democracy. Machiavelli’s Discourses Livy carries with it similar aspects of Isocrates’ logos politikos. Many of the Founding Fathers, particularly Jefferson and Madison, stressed the importance for civic engagement for the great American experiment to be successful (even though Jefferson thought another revolution was likely to occur within 50 years). Emerson’s “town-hall meeting” ideal encourages learned democratic deliberation. And let us not forget about John Dewey (even though, as Muir tells us, he forgot about Isocrates), who’s pedagogy and political philosophy stress practicality and deliberation in the hope of producing “intelligent action.” Furthermore, I’m not entirely convinced logos politikos belonged entirely to Isocrates. Timmerman notes how Isocrates is extending Protagoras’ educational system, adjusting it where he finds it necessary (149).
Rather than asking whether or not Isocrates was complex enough to address philosophia in a number of ways, the more important question asks, “Why?” Isocrates consistently connects his approach to that which is useful. Thus, engaging in multiple interpretations ofphilosophia is a practical endeavor, which “includes cultivation of the mind, use of logos, education, practical wisdom, and morality” (Timmerman, 150). Isocrates’ diligent concern toward usefulness increases the likelihood that his overall approach was not only knowledgeable of all four approaches, but weaved the best aspects of them together such that intelligent, yet practical deliberation and action were produced. Described as “the quintessence of common sense” (Livingstone, 27), Isocrates’ project starkly contrasts Plato and many of the sophists, which he claims are simply preparing to do philosophy (Antidosis, 266). The four forms rightly fall under Isocrates’ broader philosophical project: cultivating a practical approach to living in and engaging with the polis. Presently, we have a “philosophy of…” everything, be it the television show South Park or Michelangelo’s underwear, which amounts to a philosophy of nothing. Isocrates’ concern for practicality accounts for his need to incorporate all the varieties of philosophia, implementing them when they are most useful. He is concerned with neither philosophy for philosophy’s sake, nor rhetoric for rhetoric’s sake.
Performative complement:
As an addendum to my written response, this video “performance” is supposed to represent my answer to the part of sweetdiogenes’ question that asks, “is there a way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project?” Objections to my post (and -perhaps- some errors on my part) notwithstanding, I think that one way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project would be to merge both of their ideas in with Chaim Perelman’s idea of the universal audience.
Specifically, and without having fully worked out the details of this merging, I think that the universal audience would serve as a way to mediate between what I see as Aristotle’s devaluation of phronēsis in his hierarchy of virtue, and the circularity of Isocrates’ idea of phronēsis being the highest (or end) virtue. It would accomplish this by serving as an abstracted projection of the values of a concrete culture, thereby serving as a foundation for end-virtues while maintaining the concrete connection to the values of a given community.
The video performance is supposed to be a parody of Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi, which is a part of his qatsi documentary series that gets frequently parodied over YouTube. The idea behind the film (in my interpretation) is to give a (somewhat judgmental) grand overview depiction of human’s relationship to technology. My parody uses the ambiguous location of the viewer (third-person, bird’s eye view) as a place to visually represent the universal audience. Further, it shows a series of clips that represent things from our culture that would be subject to negative judgment by our own standards (I use “our culture” and “our standards” loosely here), such as nuclear weaponry, propoganda, Nancy Grace, Chernobyl, and general environmental destruction- hence the name “Moroniqatsi,” which, if you didn’t catch it, is a combination of “Koyaanisqatsi” and “moron.” The main idea is to give a depiction of judgment from the perspective of a universal audience, because the universal audience is my proposed answer to the Isocrates-Aristotle problem.
As an addendum to my written response, this video “performance” is supposed to represent my answer to the part of sweetdiogenes’ question that asks, “is there a way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project?” Objections to my post (and -perhaps- some errors on my part) notwithstanding, I think that one way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project would be to merge both of their ideas in with Chaim Perelman’s idea of the universal audience.
Specifically, and without having fully worked out the details of this merging, I think that the universal audience would serve as a way to mediate between what I see as Aristotle’s devaluation of phronēsis in his hierarchy of virtue, and the circularity of Isocrates’ idea of phronēsis being the highest (or end) virtue. It would accomplish this by serving as an abstracted projection of the values of a concrete culture, thereby serving as a foundation for end-virtues while maintaining the concrete connection to the values of a given community.
The video performance is supposed to be a parody of Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi, which is a part of his qatsi documentary series that gets frequently parodied over YouTube. The idea behind the film (in my interpretation) is to give a (somewhat judgmental) grand overview depiction of human’s relationship to technology. My parody uses the ambiguous location of the viewer (third-person, bird’s eye view) as a place to visually represent the universal audience. Further, it shows a series of clips that represent things from our culture that would be subject to negative judgment by our own standards (I use “our culture” and “our standards” loosely here), such as nuclear weaponry, propoganda, Nancy Grace, Chernobyl, and general environmental destruction- hence the name “Moroniqatsi,” which, if you didn’t catch it, is a combination of “Koyaanisqatsi” and “moron.” The main idea is to give a depiction of judgment from the perspective of a universal audience, because the universal audience is my proposed answer to the Isocrates-Aristotle problem.
As an addendum to my written response, this video “performance” is supposed to represent my answer to the part of sweetdiogenes’ question that asks, “is there a way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project?” Objections to my post (and -perhaps- some errors on my part) notwithstanding, I think that one way to conceive of an Isocrates-Aristotle project would be to merge both of their ideas in with Chaim Perelman’s idea of the universal audience.
Specifically, and without having fully worked out the details of this merging, I think that the universal audience would serve as a way to mediate between what I see as Aristotle’s devaluation of phronēsis in his hierarchy of virtue, and the circularity of Isocrates’ idea of phronēsis being the highest (or end) virtue. It would accomplish this by serving as an abstracted projection of the values of a concrete culture, thereby serving as a foundation for end-virtues while maintaining the concrete connection to the values of a given community.
The video performance is supposed to be a parody of Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi, which is a part of his qatsi documentary series that gets frequently parodied over YouTube. The idea behind the film (in my interpretation) is to give a (somewhat judgmental) grand overview depiction of human’s relationship to technology. My parody uses the ambiguous location of the viewer (third-person, bird’s eye view) as a place to visually represent the universal audience. Further, it shows a series of clips that represent things from our culture that would be subject to negative judgment by our own standards (I use “our culture” and “our standards” loosely here), such as nuclear weaponry, propoganda, Nancy Grace, Chernobyl, and general environmental destruction- hence the name “Moroniqatsi,” which, if you didn’t catch it, is a combination of “Koyaanisqatsi” and “moron.” The main idea is to give a depiction of judgment from the perspective of a universal audience, because the universal audience is my proposed answer to the Isocrates-Aristotle problem.
Blogos Politikos 