Rhetoric, society, and the critical response

Rhetorical criticism as moral action

“…In 1972 Wander and Steven Jenkins delivered a "diatribe" on the tendency for rhetorical critics to content themselves with sterile academic studies that took no overt stand on social issues but had the effect of placing critics on the side of the "establishment." 4 Despite the intellectual power arrayed against their views, we find much with which we can agree in these writings by Wander, Jenkins, and McGee. We would, however, state their argument differently, and hopefully in the process strengthen their position.…”

Rhetorical studies escapes modernist psychology: Samuel Becker as subversive

“…1970 The work on "rhetoric" and the rhetorical studies curriculum in and around 1970 was exciting at the time and fascinating in hindsight. In the intellectual eddies of the period one can see the multiple and even contradictory conceptual impulses that played upon and through scholars' minds: the last gasp of positivist science was seeking to discipline rhetoric and make it its handmaiden (Bowers, 1968), yet the call of the "moral demand" (Burgess, 1970) of "ethical" rhetorical acts (Haiman, 1967) seemingly made scientistic description superfluous; Ehninger (1968) was preaching a kind of history-of-ideas approach to the organization of rhetorical theories into periodized, abstracted forms even while Wander and Jenkins (1972) were formulating a theory of rhetoric as substantively grounded in outrightly political, situationally specific conversations about matters of import; Douglass and Arnold (1970) were systematizing logos just as Windt (1972) was specifying its limits.…”

Celebrating diversity in the communication field

“…Philip Wander (1983Wander ( , 1993Wander & Jenkins, 1972) has repeatedly and passionately advocated criticism that identifies and challenges vested, powerful interests that reproduce grevious inequities. James West (1993West ( , 1995 has published stunning analyses of the ways in which discursive structures and practices sustain violence between intimates.…”