On teaching writing and rhetoric

Today I am working on a revised syllabus for my rhetoric and public speaking course. I had to make some revisions because 1. I didn't schedule enough time for speech-giving, 2. I scheduled classes for both Martin Luther King Day and Easter Monday, which are both days off for students, and 3. We had a snow day cancellation. That means we got 2 weeks behind. A bit embarrassing, but not irremediable. We'll present final speeches during finals week - the final is a reflection essay that they can easily finish in an hour.  So we can gain at least one hour back because of that mistake. And I can hurry along the speeches - one class is smaller, so they can gain another hour back simply by staying on time for their speeches. And finally, I can cut information about crafting presentations because they use templates anyway - and probably AI...

I have been thinking quite a bit about what this course should look like going forward.  Although a public speaking course, it draws on much of what I taught as a composition teacher. It takes Aristotle's Art of Rhetoric as its text, so it is a course in classical rhetoric, as well as in argumentation with a tiny bit of formal logic thrown in and some overview of rhetorical devices and stylistic flourishes. It is also a course in public discourse about people, ideas, justice, events, issues, etc. 

 At its core, it should really be a course in being human.  What I want this course to be is an opportunity for students to test out ideas, to practice defending their position on certain issues, and to work on their ability to express their ideas lucidly, forcefully, factually, aesthetically, ethically, logically, compassionately, etc., etc. This is the part of the class I need to work on. To that end, I am cancelling some reading/discussion one day and giving more time to class debate. And I'm trying to craft a way to encourage interaction with some Nobel Prize speeches and Wendell Berry's Jefferson lecture, and Chimamanda Adichie's TED talk on "The Dangers of a Single Story."  I want students to craft responses to these in class discussion - do these words mean anything to them - challenging or encouraging? But I wish I had more time in class for reading them closely. 

Next fall when I teach this class again, I want to spend less time reading Aristotle's Rhetoric, even though I enjoy this text more each time I go through it. The first read through isn't easy, although Aristotle purports to cover his ideas systematically. And he does! - it just takes a minute to find that system. It's basically this: Here are the 3 basic types of speeches, and here are the 3 basic types of proofs or appeals. Within each of those, we find further types of proofs and descriptions of character that apply to both the speaker and the audience. We learn about the kind of language and the kinds of emotions that can be appealed to in order to gain a connection and understanding. Then Aristotle gives us a third section of the book dedicated to delivery, language or style, and arrangement. This is the clearest section because it is so practical. 

I'm not sure I need to require my students to read the whole text, although it is not long. What I need to do is more pairing of Aristotle and contemporary speeches. Or perhaps read it backwards - start with the practical to win trust ... Or just make selections of the key parts. He does repeat himself.  

What my approach has looked like:

15 or so pages of reading before each class during the Aristotle unit, followed by analysis of speeches or writing speeches, some video clips that model a concept, short assignments as scaffolding for larger ones - like write a hook and thesis statement in class, voice exercises, a logic "workshop" and a rhetorical device hunt through MLK, Jr's "I have a dream" and the Gettysburg Address. I need to have them practice writing some "sound bites" or rhetorical expressions that they can use in their next speeches. I want to incorporate small group discussion - having students lead the questioning. This means they need to read and prepare before class. 

One challenge is combatting the use of AI. Since a lot of the grade for this class is based on their oral presentations, AI is not quite as much of a challenge, but I noticed last semester that students must have submitted their study guides to AI to answer because some of their answers on the quizzes were similar - but wrong. They would be close to what I was looking for, but using different terms or expressions that what is present in our text. Maybe they were just using a different translation, but I suspect they asked AI for the study guide answers, instead of looking to their texts. 

I struggle not to have a doomsday attitude about AI, but it is just too prevalent.  I hate that it is in my gmail inbox without my permission summarizing my emails.  I hate that the first response to internet searches is an AI response that often falls short. I hate that students think it is easier to give their homework to AI to finish rather than value the process of learning. And then there are surveillance and autonomous weapons concerns that no longer are the things of science fiction.  Meanwhile, I heard a clip on the radio a couple days ago about genome editing currently occurring. I'm guessing AI is involved in some way. Not hard to imagine a nefarious AI editing to make humans even more willing to turn over their brains to computers...

Which is why learning to communicate and to persuade others is an important human skill. The why is just is important, if not more, than the how.  My goal is to keep turning the conversation back to the question of what it means to be human: to reason, to feel, to admire and appreciate, to take responsibility, to love.

Snapshots of life and the music of Purgatory

 As with all things, the sun rises, the sun sets, disappointments fade, and we move on to the next thing.  This week started with some difficult conversations, but ended with a delightful visit from our granddaughter and a celebration of our oldest son's birthday.  He has reached the age where I'm a little astounded to say that I have a son who is 29. Since people here know me as the mother of an 11 year old, I sometimes want to pull out a family photo and say, "Look, there are others!" 

Our celebration was a little muted because of the terrible flu going around. Our daughter-in-law ended up staying home with it, and the dinner party we'd planned was smaller both because of flu and because some of their friends had week-old twins a little earlier than expected.  The dad came by to say happy birthday. I ordered them a copy of Everywhere Babies by Susan Meyers and Seven Silly Eaters by Mary Ann Hoberman, since they have a two and a four year old at home. 

How many different lives do we live? Each day a new birthing and dying. 

On the other end, another friend has lost a parent.  This is the season we are in now - losing parents, gaining grandchildren.  We are in the midst of planning visits to our own parents in the next month or so.  

Sunday afternoon, I drove a couple hours south to meet up with my high school track coach and one of the runners from my club track team that I still keep in touch with. It was a great visit reliving glory days, and although it meant a lot of time in the car, it reminded me of how wonderful it is to stay connected with these friends from the past.  My track coach was a middle school history teacher and then a high school botany teacher and coached for decades. Although now in his 80s, he still talks about continuing to coach, but it is probably wishful thinking. His wife died not long ago and her care required all of his time and attention for several years. He remembers an astounding amount of detail about the past. His comments about wanting to coach reminded me of the need to have purpose and meaning even in your ninth decade.

These days I run rarely in between aches and pains in my feet and knees, although I've made it to the gym more often. For Lent, I've been trying to be on time and to be considerate of my husband by going to bed earlier. Although I have regularly fallen short in this practice, I have noticed that going to bed early results in better sleep as all the studies say. 

Since I'm not reading anything too exciting right now, this is easier to do. For my book club, we are reading Dante's Purgatorio, which is timely for Lent. What sin, what disordered love, keeps me from Paradise? So many! Those suffering from accedia and from pride are the two that seem most familiar. I've enjoyed revisiting Dante again after many years, through the Mark Musa translation (although I tried listening to a Librivox recording of the Longfellow translation on Sunday during my drive - hard to stay attentive to!) I've noticed more strikingly this time, the curious lack of references to Christ but the abudance of reference to myths and artistic representations of people of virtue, as well as the references to songs as the souls progress.  I looked up a few:

When the souls reach the gates of Purgatory they sing the "Te Deum":

And the prideful sing Beati paupere:

While some of the souls blind to the gospel hear Lucis ante:

Summae Deus clementiae is the hymn of the lustful, which I couldn't find, but here is Beati mundo corde - Blessed are the pure of heart - another verse they sing:

And just as Virgil departs, the souls sing Venite benedicti Patris mei, in the 27th canto as they leave the circle of the lustful.

I'll close with that, although perhaps I should draw the connection between the purgations of Lent, and opportunities to offer up the illness and aging in this world for forgiveness in the next. I hope to make more notes on reading Dante at some point. 

Recent Watching

My daughter and I are feeling a little bereft this Sunday - there are no more episodes of All Creatures Great and Small to look forward to.  The series has warmed our hearts for the past four years, and every time a new season has been released, we look forward to watching it on Sunday evenings. It's a lovely end to the weekend/beginning of a new week, and an unqualified positive family viewing experience. I can't think of a single episode where I've felt I had to filter anything.  A few episodes have caused tears when an animal has died or when something sad has happened related to the war, but primarily we are lifted up by the warmth of the family connections, the wholesomeness of caring for animals, and the beauty of the Yorkshire Dales. It's been a bonding experience for my daughter and me, even though her siblings don't all watch along with us and are annoyed when they call for their Sunday check in, and we are occupied watching the show. 

****Spoiler alert!  ********

  

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10590066/mediaviewer/rm763092738/

The last episode of season 5 had the feel of a finale.  There are a few loose ends, but although we've been rooting for Tristan and Maggie and Mrs. Hall and Siegfried to acknowledge they have feelings for each other, it's really more appropriate for the season to have ended the way it did.  Love doesn't always end in marriage, and fondness might be a better word for the affection between Mrs. Hall and Siegfried.  They need each other because they don't have someone else, and after years of sharing a home, it's no wonder they care deeply for each other. But I admire the show's writers for showing restraint.  While the show may be dismissed as sentimental, at least it doesn't descend into excess romantic fodder with an unlikely and inappropriate love affair.  I could be wrong and there might be another season in which the vet and the housekeeper actually are able to transcend their class and educational differences, but I'm all for a bittersweet restraint.  

The drama between Tristan and Maggie is a little different. I have a hard time believing in the unlikely Tristan - Charlotte Beauvoir love affair.  Charlotte is from a much more privileged background, and although in a moment of youthful rebellion and idealism, she ran off from home to be a part of the war effort, she may mature into an appreciation for her station.  And while Tristan has matured because of his experiences, he also is wounded emotionally by them and by survivor's guilt.  For now Charlotte seems remarkably understanding, and remarkably well-adjusted to simple pleasures like dining at Skedale House for the holidays.  Does she love Tristan enough to settle in there or will Tristan be able to class up to her father's house?  Or will he return to his love for Maggie?  Maggie didn't choose Tristan the first time she married, and even though Arthur has apparently died (or is he just MIA assumed dead?), she probably isn't in a hurry to remarry (although widows with small children might be excused from mourning for a long time). These are the slight dramas that keep viewers returning week after week - beyond just the simple joy of imaginatively stepping into life in the countryside of Northern England for a minute.  Someday I'd like to visit. Maybe mother-daughter trip is in our future.  Or at least a read along from the books to keep the story alive ...

*****

 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5622316/mediaviewer/rm388236289/

Our other viewing this Lent has been The Chosen. We started the series in Advent, and just finished the first 3 seasons.  It's short enough to watch an episode on a Wednesday or Thursday, although I don't prefer weeknight TV.  After a slow start, we've been drawn into the series, but I have a few reservations about it.  I have mixed emotions about my daughter watching it before the Bible stories are deep in her psyche because I'd prefer her to have her own imaginative image of Jesus and his disciples and to be able to tell when the creators of the show are filling in gaps in the story and when they are drawing straight from Scripture.  Sometimes it's easy to tell because the characters break into contemporary idioms and talk like they are well-versed in contemporary communication skills - for instance, the disciples and the women have moments when they talk about feelings that make me feel like I'm seeing an enactment of some therapists recommendation for how to have difficult conversations with those you love, like when Tamar and Mary Magdalene share about their past.  The character of Peter is played in a much different way than I imagine him, and some of the scenes between him and his wife Eden are a bit cringy.  I like the character Zebedee, father of James and John, and I like the way Elizabeth and Zachariah were portrayed in the first episode of season 4, which we just watched.  This episode is about the death of John the Baptist and was probably one of my least favorite.  John the Baptist is portrayed as something of a looney, and his hair and beard look too much like a wig.  Salome's dance is weird and erotic, and while it probably was erotic, was it as weird as this one? The actress who plays Salome is super muscly and not particularly demur.  It's an odd scene. And then the death of John the Baptist is almost laughable. He is brought into the executioner's room and just calmly strokes the chopping block. He engages in conversation with the Roman executioner who is polishing the silver platter for his head about wedding feasts, and the exchange ends with John saying "You wouldn't get it" to the executioner about the image of a wedding feast.  These are John's "last words" that the Roman documenting the execution writes down.  Odd choice of words to give to John. 

The show also presents some events out of sequence.  The death of John the Baptist in the Gospel of Matthew occurs before the feeding of the 5000 and Jesus walking on the water, but the show reverses these events.  It leaves out the disciples burying the body of John the Baptist, and it has someone else telling Jesus, not the disciples. Why would the writers reverse these episodes from both Matthew's and Mark's gospels? And why give John such a ridiculous thing to say for his last words? 

I can overlook the addition of imagined events in the lives of the disciples and the contemporary conversations, as well as the sometimes awkward scenes that perhaps weren't rehearsed as much as they could have been, but I am bothered by the reworking of the Gospels to fit some story line that really doesn't need to be reordered for the purposes of the show, to my mind. I assume the writers consult with historians and theologians as they create the timeline and story arc for this dramatization, but this shift seems unnecessary.  At the very least, it does provide opportunity for conversation about the events of the Bible, and sometimes sends us to Scripture to fact check, which I'm sure is one of the goals of the creators, who film most episodes in Midlothian, Texas, as a stand-in for Israel. While we were living in Texas, I never wondered if the landscape were similar to the Middle East, in the way I did in California with its olive groves and other Mediterranean climate similarities, but perhaps I should have!