In his "Introduction [to "Symposium: Comparative Rhetorical Studies in the New Contact Zone: Chinese Rhetoric Reimagined,"] C. Jan Swearingen offers a cultural comparison between the understanding of rhetoric in the United States, using Socratic and other Greeks' methodology, and the Chinese understanding of rhetoric that employs Confucius and Mencius, among others. Swearingen asserts "we can better understand the habits of speaking, writing, and thinking that Chinese students bring with them to the composition classroom" (33). Like with any student from a culture that is different from the mainstream, teachers and other students must pause when looking at writing; culture influences what a person writes, and each culture, each student is different.
To explain the differences in Chinese and English rhetorical writing styles, Swearingen describes the difficulties with translating words and their meanings from Chinese, a logographic language, to English, a phonemic language, and vice versa (Swearingen 34). While translations between any two languages lose certain amount of meaning due to a loss of contextual information within the primary language, the differences between Chinese and English are sometimes greater because of the nuances of the characters for certain words. English rhetoric is based on Greek philosophy, drawing from minds like Socrates and Plato; in contrast, Chinese rhetoric looks to Confucius and Mencius. While these two teachings have obvious differences, from history to philosophy, these two teachings overlap, too. The Chinese xiuci "aims to establish one's integrity" (Swearingen 35), which can be seen as a type of ethos. Similarly, it emphasizes the appropriate use of language, the timing and content--kairos.
Overall, Chinese rhetorical principles, the ci and yan, encourage getting the message from the speaker to the audience: "using rhetoric to seek truth and condemn the manipulative and deceitful use of discourse" (Swearingen 35). In the United States, the negatively perceived "rhetoric" is understood as disingenuous, the Chinese, too, see flowery language as manipulative or purposefully confusing language as a poor use of rhetoric. Where high school students in the United States learn the five paragraph essay, Chinese students may learn the eight-legged essay (Swearingen 37). Similar to the former, the latter style emphasizes eight points: the opening, amplification, preliminary exposition, initial argument, central argument, latter argument, final argument, and conclusion. Teachers in the United States may examine Chinese students' writing through their own lens, but understanding even the basics of Chinese rhetoric will further one's understanding of the writing.
Similarly, Andrea Lunsford explores the ways in which culture influenced Gloria Anzaldúa, as shown in her interview "Toward a Mestiza Rhetoric: Gloria Anzaldúa on Composition and Postcoloniality." Throughout the session, Andzaldúa poignantly describes how her identity shaped her writing, and how her writing shaped her identity. As a child, she told stories and kept journals, making narrative a part of her oral and written identities (Lundsford 47). However, when Anzaldúa applied her knowledge of writing in her essays for school, teachers chastised her for not following the "rules" of composition (Lundsford 50). Ever since, Anzaldúa has worked to make her voices heard by expressing her ideas, opinions, and stories to effect change. Writing is part of identity because it is wrapped up in self-expression, a process of liberalization and emancipation (Lundsford 62).
In a similar manner, Anzaldúa says that "Identity is very much a fictive construction" (Lundsford 66). A student must use their surroundings, their cultural and geographical surroundings, what people label him or her, and what the student identifies as elements of his character. Lundsford emphasizes the importance of a student's recognition of voice, where teachers may work: "to find ways to help students recognize their own multiple voices" (59). The analogy of identity as a personal remolino, a vortex of "values, ideology, and identity" (Lundsford 71) works to describe how a student conveys his or her own voice through writing, his or her own identity.
Works Cited
Swearingen, C. Jan and LuMing Mao. "Introduction [to "Symposium: Comparative Rhetorical Studies in the New Contact Zone: Chinese Rhetoric Reimagined."]: Double Trouble: Seeing Chinese Rhetoric through Its Own Lens." College Composition and Composition 60.4 (June 2009): W35-45.
Lunsford, Andrea. "Toward a Mestiza Rhetoric: Gloria Anzaldua on Composition and Postcoloniality." In Race, Rhetoric, and the Postcolonial. Ed. Gary Olson and Lynn Worhsam. Pp. 43-78.
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