Contemporary Rhetorical Theory: A Reader

This indispensable text brings together important essays on the themes, issues, and controversies that have shaped the development of rhetorical theory since the late 1960s. An extensive introduction and epilogue by the editors thoughtfully examine the current state of the field and its future directions, focusing in particular on how theorists are negotiating the tensions between modernist and postmodernist considerations. Each of the volume's eight main sections comprises a brief explanatory introduction, four to six essays selected for their enduring significance, and suggestions for further reading. Topics addressed include problems of defining rhetoric, the relationship between rhetoric and epistemology, the rhetorical situation, reason and public morality, the nature of the audience, the role of discourse in social change, rhetoric in the mass media, and challenges to rhetorical theory from the margins. An extensive subject index facilitates comparison of key concepts and principles across all of the essays featured.

John Louis Lucaites (PhD, University of Iowa, 1984) is associate professor in the Department of Communication and Culture, adjunct associate professor in American Studies at Indiana University. He is also a Fellow at the Poynter center for the Study of Ethics at Indiana University. He teaches courses in rhetorical theory and the relationship between rhetoric and social theory. His current research focuses on the critique of liberalism and democratic culture. He is the coauthor with Celeste Michelle Condit of Crafting Equality: America's Anglo-African Word (Marie Hochmuth Nichols Award for Outstanding Scholarship, National Communication Association, 1993).

Celeste Michelle Condit (PhD, University of Iowa, 1982) is Professor of Speech Communication at the University of Georgia. She is coediting Women's studies in Communication. Her books include Decoding Abortion Rhetoric: The Communication of Social Change (University of Illinois, 1990) and Crafting Equality: America's Anglo-African Word (University of Chicago, 1993; coauthored with John Louis Lucaites). She was the corecipient of the Marie Hochmuth Nichols Award and the Golden Monograph Award and the recipient of the Dogulas Ehninger Award.

Sally A. Caudill (PhD, University of Georgia, 1998) is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Macalester College. She has published several essays on women's roles in reproductive technologies and public speaking. At present, her research interests include multicultural communication and the rhetoric of resistance. She has won numerous teaching awards and served as a student representative to the Women's Caucus of the National Communication Association.