WITHIN DUE BOUNDS : THE BURDEN OF THE PAST AND THE CONCEPTION OF FORMAL RHETORIC IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY PHILADELPHIA.

Format:

Book

Thesis/Dissertation

Author/Creator:

BARONE, DENNIS BRIAN.

Contributor:

University of Pennsylvania.

Subjects (All):

American literature.

0591.

Local Subjects:

0591.

Physical Description:

168 pages

Contained In:

Dissertation Abstracts International 46-01A.

System Details:

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

text file

Summary:

The study examines the ambivalence ascribed to formal rhetoric in eighteenth-century Philadelphia and it argues that the dominant conception of formal rhetoric was antithetical to the larger cultural challenge to traditional authority. The first chapter discusses the Society of Friends' distrust of formal rhetoric and the emergence of formal rhetorical theory in eighteenth-century Philadelphia. The second chapter analyzes the rhetorical theory and practice of James Logan and Gilbert Tennent. The third chapter describes the establishment of a course in formal rhetoric at the College of Philadelphia by Provost William Smith that set the pattern for rhetorical studies in Philadelphia from the mid-eighteenth-century until the third decade of the nineteenth century. The fourth chapter analyzes several challenges to the dominant conception of formal rhetoric during and after the War for Independence and concludes that the teaching of formal rhetoric survived the Revolutionary era virtually unscathed. Once the teaching of formal rhetoric began at the Friends Latin School and at the College of Philadelphia, it continued for the most part unchanged until well into the nineteenth-century. For the most part, only young male members of the gentry learned the lessons of formal rhetoric. Formal rhetoric came late in a young gentleman's schooling and was necessary for men whose business it was, as William Smith said, "to Think, Speak, Write and Act for the General Good."

Notes:

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 46-01, Section: A, page: 0149.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Pennsylvania, 1984.

Local Notes:

School code: 0175.

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.