The dominant discourse surrounding the teaching of writing focuses on texts and thoughts, words a... more The dominant discourse surrounding the teaching of writing focuses on texts and thoughts, words and ideas, as though these entities existed apart from the bodies of teachers, writers, audiences, communities. As a discipline, broadly speaking, we in composition and rhetoric have not acknowledged that we have a body, bodies; we cannot admit that our prevailing metaphors and tropes should be read across the body, or that our work has material, corporeal bases, effects and affects. Yet some recent attention to embodiment and to body politics in composition theory and research, and indeed the creation of a collection like this, suggests that we are beginning to recognize the corporeal entailments, foundations, and connections in the teaching of writing (see Fleckenstein, Hawhee, Couture, Lewiecki-Wilson and Wilson, McRuer). In this essay, I will build on this momentum as I argue that, in fact, ignoring the body has serious consequences. As we compose media, we must also—always—compose embodiment. I will also argue that we must be careful about which bodies we conceptualize. In this essay, I will critically investigate the ways that embodied pedagogy can be developed without invoking normative models of embodiment. And I will make some modest suggestions about ways that we can develop technologies and pedagogies for writing that not only affirm the body, but that affirm all bodies.
By examining Stitches, David Small’s 2009 graphic memoir of medical trauma, we seek to understand... more By examining Stitches, David Small’s 2009 graphic memoir of medical trauma, we seek to understand comics memoir in general and comics memoirs of trauma and disability in particular. Drawing on theories of comics, multimodality, autobiography, trauma, and disability studies, we explore these “difficult articulations” as a way to examine how both self and trauma/disability are constructed in the multimodal textual space of a comics memoir.
View all references) when he noted the field's consistent engagement with the id... more View all references) when he noted the field's consistent engagement with the idea that what is at stake ought to be discovered for the good of the community (5). The Octalogs have provided a space for exploring varied notions concerning rhetoric's role in serving a common good ...
I will examine Ellis Island in the early 20th century as a “special rhetorical space,” a heteroto... more I will examine Ellis Island in the early 20th century as a “special rhetorical space,” a heterotopia for the invention of new categories of deviation. And I will suggest that Ellis Island floats into every aspect of contemporary American society. As Robert Chang has argued, “the border is not just a peripheral phenomenon…to be an immigrant is to be marked [always] by the border” (27). Further, “it is through its flexible operation that the border helps to construct and contain the nation and the national community” (Chang 27). Ellis Island has been rhetorically used, internalized, incorporated, embodied.
The author argues that we have chosen a rhetorical history that normalizes and silences rhetorica... more The author argues that we have chosen a rhetorical history that normalizes and silences rhetorical bodies. In response, the author exhumes an embodied history of rhetoric, reexamining the myths of the Greek goddess Metis as a means of enlivening rhetorical theory and history. The author then connects these myths to other rhetorical traditions invoked by Hélène Cixous and Gloria Anzaldúa, connecting Metis to Medusa and to mestiza consciousness. The author affirms the rhetorical power of the body, specifically of those bodies that challenge rhetorical norms.
This essay challenges accepted versions of rhetorical history by recovering the mythical figure o... more This essay challenges accepted versions of rhetorical history by recovering the mythical figure of Hephaestus and the cunning rhetoric he embodied, metis. This critical retelling offers a new and more expansive perspective on history, rhetoric, and embodiment, as it lays bare many of our assumptions about the available means of persuasion. The author asserts that a cunning approach to rhetoric might allow for the celebration of all of our embodied differences.
This essay locates discourses about disability in opposing spaces – prose and poetry, the literal... more This essay locates discourses about disability in opposing spaces – prose and poetry, the literal and the metaphorical. The author explodes the binary and charts a new territory, following disability to challenge language use, to reveal the metaphorical nature of prose and the literal power of poetry, to shake up the terms that objectify people with disabilities and to listen, look and feel for new ways to express bodily experience.
The dominant discourse surrounding the teaching of writing focuses on texts and thoughts, words a... more The dominant discourse surrounding the teaching of writing focuses on texts and thoughts, words and ideas, as though these entities existed apart from the bodies of teachers, writers, audiences, communities. As a discipline, broadly speaking, we in composition and rhetoric have not acknowledged that we have a body, bodies; we cannot admit that our prevailing metaphors and tropes should be read across the body, or that our work has material, corporeal bases, effects and affects. Yet some recent attention to embodiment and to body politics in composition theory and research, and indeed the creation of a collection like this, suggests that we are beginning to recognize the corporeal entailments, foundations, and connections in the teaching of writing (see Fleckenstein, Hawhee, Couture, Lewiecki-Wilson and Wilson, McRuer). In this essay, I will build on this momentum as I argue that, in fact, ignoring the body has serious consequences. As we compose media, we must also—always—compose embodiment. I will also argue that we must be careful about which bodies we conceptualize. In this essay, I will critically investigate the ways that embodied pedagogy can be developed without invoking normative models of embodiment. And I will make some modest suggestions about ways that we can develop technologies and pedagogies for writing that not only affirm the body, but that affirm all bodies.
By examining Stitches, David Small’s 2009 graphic memoir of medical trauma, we seek to understand... more By examining Stitches, David Small’s 2009 graphic memoir of medical trauma, we seek to understand comics memoir in general and comics memoirs of trauma and disability in particular. Drawing on theories of comics, multimodality, autobiography, trauma, and disability studies, we explore these “difficult articulations” as a way to examine how both self and trauma/disability are constructed in the multimodal textual space of a comics memoir.
View all references) when he noted the field's consistent engagement with the id... more View all references) when he noted the field's consistent engagement with the idea that what is at stake ought to be discovered for the good of the community (5). The Octalogs have provided a space for exploring varied notions concerning rhetoric's role in serving a common good ...
I will examine Ellis Island in the early 20th century as a “special rhetorical space,” a heteroto... more I will examine Ellis Island in the early 20th century as a “special rhetorical space,” a heterotopia for the invention of new categories of deviation. And I will suggest that Ellis Island floats into every aspect of contemporary American society. As Robert Chang has argued, “the border is not just a peripheral phenomenon…to be an immigrant is to be marked [always] by the border” (27). Further, “it is through its flexible operation that the border helps to construct and contain the nation and the national community” (Chang 27). Ellis Island has been rhetorically used, internalized, incorporated, embodied.
The author argues that we have chosen a rhetorical history that normalizes and silences rhetorica... more The author argues that we have chosen a rhetorical history that normalizes and silences rhetorical bodies. In response, the author exhumes an embodied history of rhetoric, reexamining the myths of the Greek goddess Metis as a means of enlivening rhetorical theory and history. The author then connects these myths to other rhetorical traditions invoked by Hélène Cixous and Gloria Anzaldúa, connecting Metis to Medusa and to mestiza consciousness. The author affirms the rhetorical power of the body, specifically of those bodies that challenge rhetorical norms.
This essay challenges accepted versions of rhetorical history by recovering the mythical figure o... more This essay challenges accepted versions of rhetorical history by recovering the mythical figure of Hephaestus and the cunning rhetoric he embodied, metis. This critical retelling offers a new and more expansive perspective on history, rhetoric, and embodiment, as it lays bare many of our assumptions about the available means of persuasion. The author asserts that a cunning approach to rhetoric might allow for the celebration of all of our embodied differences.
This essay locates discourses about disability in opposing spaces – prose and poetry, the literal... more This essay locates discourses about disability in opposing spaces – prose and poetry, the literal and the metaphorical. The author explodes the binary and charts a new territory, following disability to challenge language use, to reveal the metaphorical nature of prose and the literal power of poetry, to shake up the terms that objectify people with disabilities and to listen, look and feel for new ways to express bodily experience.
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