Page 44 - Critical and Cultural Theory

CHAPTER 3

RHETORIC

If addressing questions to do with language and interpretation is
always, to some extent, a case of facing the imponderable, this is
especially apposite for the issue of rhetoric. Many critical texts
explain rhetoric away as the art of expression and persuasion.
However, there is a wide diversity of opinion as to what ultimately
constitutes this art. The moment one begins to delve beneath
superficial definitions of rhetoric as the knack of using verbal
devices in sophisticated ways, a veritable can of linguistic worms
gets open. It soon becomes clear that rhetoric is not merely a
matter of being clever with words or being able to handle complex
devices in a convincing and entertaining fashion. Rhetoric may,
indeed, be the art of expression and persuasion - an art whose
currency consists of figures of speech, images and tropes. Yet,
these elements are not mere embellishments of ordinary language
used exclusively by orators, poets and fiction writers. In fact, they
pervade language in its entirety.
Language as a system of signs and symbols' is always based on
figures of some kind - namely, conventional elements that define
things in their absence. If a poem or song tells you that 'life is a
long road', you may instantly take the proposition as an image, a
piece of rhetoric. You know that an association has been made
between two ideas in ways which you are not expected to take
literally. If, in unfamiliar surroundings, you ask for directions to
your destination and you are told 'this road will take you there',
you will probably not register the statement as a piece of rhetoric.

' •*" Refer to Part I, Chapter 1, 'Meaning' and Part I, Chapter 2, The Sign' for a
detailed discussion of this theme.

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