Podcasts about isocrates

Backstage With Becca B. Episode 179 with guest John Kapelos is now LIVE on YouTube. On this episode, I talked with John about the challenges of building theater communities in L.A., his early days in Chicago's collaborative scene, and how support from his father and a role at Second City helped launch his career, how the digital age has reshaped the entertainment industry and brought more opportunities but also more competition, his thoughts on the evolution of storytelling in film and TV, his current show Aristotle/Alexander at Company Of Angels where he stars as Isocrates, historical narratives, focusing on Alexander the Great and his complex relationship with Aristotle, the psychological layers of leadership, the influence of mentorship, how these ancient stories can still resonate today, and much more!

It's time to blind you with some science! Jeff and Dave follow Marrou's masterful tome (Part II, Chapter VIII) back through the centuries to see what place the other, non-literary side of the education coin held in antiquity. In contrast to present-day obsessions with STEM, we learn that while branches of mathematics were held up as an ideal, they never really took pride of place in the general education of Greeks and Romans. Instead, despite Plato's and Isocrates' best efforts, much like today math was left to the experts. In fact, when the ancients did get their math, geometry, music, and astronomy on, they preferred them with a heaping dose of myth, magic, and mysticism (we're looking at you, Pythagoras). Come along for maybe the worst ever opening gag, some Mike Rowe inspired musings, a quick look at the Greek terror of infinity, and much more. Plus: the long-awaited drawing for the Ratio 4. Who will win?

This week Jeff and Dave continue on with Marrou's clues, finishing up the last portion of Chapter VII, Part I, Isocrates, and taking on all of Chapter I, Part II, "The Civilization of the Paideia". For Isocrates, the comparison to Plato continues, particularly with respect to the question of the teaching and inculcation of virtue. Is it possible, and if so, how is it done? Don't miss Marrou's thought-provoking concluding remarks on the relationship between P and I, how they "enriched the classical tradition without disturbing its unity." In the next portion, the guys get into the question of paideia, an old and storied concept. Specifically, how does culture, according to Marrou, become religion, and how is this a part of Alexander's enduring influence? Finally, the theme of the whole second portion of the episode focuses on how classical education took on its finalized, concrete form during the Hellenistic era (323-31 B.C.), and "thereafter it underwent no substantial change".

Isocrates, You socrates, Hesocrates? This week Jeff and Dave are back at it with the work of H. I. Marrou and education in antiquity. Here they tackle the last bit of Part I of the book, Chapter VII, and the groundbreaking "humanist" Isocrates. Born in 436, he spent the first part of his career as a "hired gun" speech-writer, before developing an influential -- and profitable -- school for rhetoric. But if you have never heard of this guy, no wonder. He has spent the last two millennia trying to creep out from beneath Plato's massive shadow. So just what is the purpose of rhetoric and dialectic? Is it to get to the truth, à la Plato, or should we veer more toward Isocrates' perspective, that rhetoric, honed by literary study, develops us into persons who are moral and useful to the state? Isocrates certainly had the time to develop his ideas, as he championed nascent Panhellenism to the rip old age of 98! Along the way, the hits keep coming, and the fallout from Jeff's opening pun is massive. Finally, don't miss the tease about how Plato spent his last days, link.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comAlexandra is a journalist and public speaker. She's the founder of Civic Renaissance, a newsletter and intellectual community dedicated to moral and cultural renewal. She's also an adjunct professor at the Indiana University Lilly School of Philanthropy. Her first book is The Soul of Civility: Timeless Principles to Heal Society and Ourselves.For two clips of our convo — on the moments when being civil is impolite, and the importance of indifference to others' opinions — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: being raised in horse country in Canada; having “Judi the Manners Lady” as a mother; moving to DC in the fall of 2016 and hating it; working for Trump in the Department of Ed; the rude awakening of being loathed by her peers as an appointee; the difference between politeness and civility; a story of Queen Victoria's bad manners; how personal boundaries are often crucial for civility; Arnold Bennett's book How to Live 24 Hours a Day; the virtue of curiosity toward those who seem boring; hypocrisy vs. inauthenticity; Tom Holland's Dominion; when the love of others and the self are in tension; online anonymity; the ever-growing need for forgiveness and gratitude; Aristotle and “the magnanimous soul”; the Stoics; Isocrates as the Miss Manners of ancient Greece; Erasmus; the “respectability politics” of the Civil Rights Movement vs. the crudeness of pro-Gaza protesters and the January 6 mob; empathy toward road-ragers; defenders of Gay retaliating with plagiarism charges of their own; Slow Horses and the crude authenticity of Oldman's character; the cult of authenticity in Gen Z; how civility and toxicity are contagious; zealous extroversion; why Alexandra wants to kill the phrase “let's get lunch”; me pressing her on how anyone praising civility could work for Trump; and why auto-didactism is the subject of her next book.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Jonathan Freedland on the war in Gaza, Jennifer Burns on her new biography of Milton Friedman, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Primary sources are invaluable as they give us direct insight into the period in question -- but they also need to be treated with caution. Let's take today's reading for example: Isocrates' The Evagoras is one of our principal sources for the Classical Period in Cyprus. For Isocrates, Evagoras was the model ruler. It depicts the king through the lens of Isocrates' personal beliefs, which, however, need to be critically analyzed. He is a rhetorician and a sophist. Ostensibly, Isocrates wants there to be unity between Spartans and Athenians -- but under Athenian hegemony. For Isocrates, to truly be a Hellene one must learn to think and live as a Hellene, i.e., possess Athenian education. Athens to Isocrates is, of course, the pinnacle of Greek culture to which a great debt is owed.   Evagoras of Salamis, then, fits the Isocratean mould and we can see what makes his character so appealing to Isocrates. According to Isocrates, Evagoras “inspired respect, not by the frowning of his brow, but by the principles of his life” (Isoc. Evagoras 9.44). Not only is Evagoras philhellenic, he is more specifically phil-Athenian. As king he “observed Greek institutions,” “the liberal arts” and “[Greek] education” (Isoc. Evagoras 9.50). He possessed all the qualities that made him a Philosopher King in his own right but most importantly, in the view of Isocrates, he was a true philhellene.  We must be cautious though; the Evagoras was written as an encomium (a eulogy) and according to Plutarch, was commissioned by his son and heir, Nicocles. Evagoras' qualities are showed as unparalleled, if not, divinely bestowed -- inherited from his ancestors, endowed by nature and willed by Zeus himself. It presents a romanticized -- and idealized -- philhellenic king. Isocrates tells the reader that, lamentably, in the years preceding Evagoras “the best rulers were those who treated the Greeks in the most cruel fashion” (Isoc. Evagoras 9.49). Yet Evagoras paradoxically campaigned against other philhellenic city-states on Cyprus. We must remember that historically, Cyprus had been fragmented politically into quasi-city kingdoms as each vied for its own independence (even the term "city-kingdoms" can be somewhat problematic). They were hardly driven by nationalistic or patriotic Hellenic sentiment, but by self-preservation. The Evagoras makes no mention of this, nor does it navigate the questionable Persian/Athenian alliance during the Corinthian War. That, of course, would be inconsistent with the story Isocrates weaves. Isocrates is decisively not an historian. But I'm far from an expert on this time period. That's why I hope you join me on August 2nd  as Professor Christian Körner from the University of Bern discusses "Cyprus Between the Assyrian and Persian Empires." For more frequent updates, follow The History of Cyprus on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thehistoryofcyprus/   

Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Isocrates was an ancient Greek rhetorician, one of the 10 Attic orators, and a teacher whose writings are an important historical source on the intellectual and political life of the Athens of his day. The school he founded, the first academy of rhetoric, was very different from the intellectual and philosophical Academy of Plato. Isocrates was contemptuous of the Platonic circles, and is considered focused on polished expression, rather than the higher intellectual pursuits. Isocrates training was almost entirely given over to rhetoric, the art of persuasion.Of his hundred pupils the most notable were Timotheus, the Athenian general, prominent in Athens's history between 378 and 355; Nicocles, the ruler of Salamis in Cyprus; and the two greatest Greek historians of the 4th century—Ephorus, who wrote a universal history, and Theopompus, who wrote the history of Philip II of Macedon. In this way his influence permeated both politics and literature. The letter to Demonicus was written approximately 374-372 BCE.Its authenticity is disputed by some, as it was believed that the verbal form and style were not consistent with the style and views of Isocrates. However, the work's influence is evident in other oratory speeches, advice to rulers, pedagogical works and essays that have borrowed its elements. The Letter to Demonicus has been used as an example and reference for many late Roman and Byzantine scholars and extracts of it have been found in seven papyri.
 This letter is offered as a gift to Demonicus. Isocrates explains that friendship, benevolence, modesty in the way of life, and does not fail to mention the difficult task of fulfilling the duties related to public functions. Isocrates points out that proper behavior not only leads to virtue, which is the highest “commodity”, and adds that virtue is also a pleasure of higher order.To listen to the Letter to Demonicus in Greek, follow this link:https://youtu.be/NuKjxVjnzN4Read more information about rhetoric here:https://www.britannica.com/topic/rhetoricFor a list of works by Isocrates:http://classics.mit.edu/Browse/browse-Isocrates.htmlAnd for more information about Isocrates and analysis of his works:http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0075:chapter=6

Jim Barnish invites Bill Lederer to The Dirt, extraordinary founder and CEO in the MAdTech space that fuses marketing, advertising, and technology. They discuss the transformations iSocrates has made from consulting to managed services to software-as-a-service (SaaS).Building a successful business depends on many factors that may change over time. What you need in a startup is likely not what you need as the business enters a growth stage and beyond.Finding partners that support your goals is another key factor in a growing company, both in life and in business. Entrepreneurship knows its highs and lows, so having a life partner that can weather the storms and celebrate the wins is essential. In business, partnering with reliable, coachable, and trustworthy individuals is just as vital.Although iSocrates operates in the technology industry, Bill emphasizes the importance of people specifically investing in their growth and trusting them in turn to grow the business. Especially in a global company, understanding differences and bridging cultural gaps is a key part of that process. 3 Key TakeawaysBe open to change and shifting priorities where needed. As Bill says, “What it took to get you to where you are is unlikely what you need to get to where you want to be.” Find a life partner who supports you through the ups and downs. And find business partners who are coachable, with high integrity.  Invest in your teams. It's not always what many venture capitalists want to hear, but it's not about the technology, it's about the people.  ResourcesBill's LinkedIniSocrates.comMAdTechBI.comProductize by Eisha ArmstrongAboutSix-time founder and CEO who discovered his career in digital media and advertising, Bill Lederer lives and breathes data. He is the founder and CEO of iSocrates, a managed service + SaaS company built to serve publishers, marketers, agencies, and enablers through a combination of MarTech and AdTech automation and solutions. 

Remixing is essential to contemporary culture. We see it in song mashups, political remix videos, memes, and even on streaming television shows like Stranger Things. But remixing isn't an exclusively digital practice, nor is it even a new one. Evidence of remixing even appears in the speeches of classical Greek and Roman orators. Turntables and Tropes: A Rhetoric of Remix, by my guest Scott Haden Church, is the first book to address the remix from a communicative perspective, examining its persuasive dimensions by locating its parallels with classical rhetoric. Church identifies, recontextualizes, mashes up, and applies rhetorical tropes to contemporary digital texts and practices. This groundbreaking book presents a new critical vocabulary for scholars and students to use as they analyze remix culture. Building upon scholarship from classical thinkers, such as Isocrates, Quintilian, Nāgārjuna, and Cicero, as well as contemporary luminaries like Kenneth Burke, Richard Lanham, and Eduardo Navas, Scott Haden Church shows that an understanding of rhetoric offers innovative ways to make sense of remix culture. SCOTT HADEN CHURCH teaches courses in media studies, communication theory, and popular culture at Brigham Young University, where he is an associate professor in the School of Communications. He has been awarded the Phyllis Japp Scholar award from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and the Ruth S. Silver Research Fellowship in Mass Media Ethics from Brigham Young University. Scott Haden Church's Turntables and Tropes: A Rhetoric of Remix is available at msupress.org and other fine booksellers. You can learn more about the book at scotthadenchurch.com and Scott is on Twitter @scotthchurch. You can connect with the press on Facebook and @msupress on Twitter, where you can also find me @kurtmilb.The MSU Press podcast is a joint production of MSU Press and the College of Arts & Letters at Michigan State University. Thanks to the team at MSU Press for helping to produce this podcast. Our theme music is “Coffee” by Cambo. Michigan State University occupies the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary Lands of the Anishinaabeg – Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa and Potawatomi people. The University resides on Land ceded in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw.

Audience is arguably the most central concept in the fields of rhetoric and tech comm. What have theorists been asking about audience from centuries ago up until the modern day, when social media has exploded the reach and interactivity of audiences? What does the evolution of audience mean for technical and professional communicators? And what is the best episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000? Books discussed include Involving the Audience by Lee-Ann Breuch and Update Culture by John Gallagher. For transcripts and sources, visit https://faculty.mnsu.edu/tctalk/

Welcome to Tell Me More!, a podcast for amplifying the work of graduate students. In this episode, we hear from Joel Bergholtz, a fourth-year PhD candidate at Florida State University in the Department of English. Joel walks us through his dissertation project on birther artifacts and the spreading of birther conspiracies, or the notion that various politicians of color must be publicly investigated. Joel also talks about race-based skepticism in public spaces and what we can do to understand them. If you'd like to learn more, chat about digital literacy and methodology, or discuss his topic further, email Joel at jmb10c@my.fsu.edu. If you'd like to learn more about the show, find transcripts, or sign up to be a guest, please check out tellmemorepod.com. Feel free to follow us on Twitter at @TMM_Pod, too. See you in the next episode! Links to things discussed in this episode: Richard Nordquist. (2019, February 17). “What Does the Term ‘Doxa' Mean? Glossary of Grammatical and Rhetorical Terms.” ThoughtCo. Takis Poulakos. (2001). “Isocrates; Use of ‘Doxa.'” Philosophy & Rhetoric, 34(1), 61–78. Jennifer Sano-Franchini. (2015). “Cultural Rhetorics and the Digital Humanities: Toward Cultural Reflexivity in Digital Making.” In Jim Ridolfo and Bill Hart-Davidson (Eds.). Rhetoric and the Digital Humanities. The University of Chicago Press. Caroline Dadas. (2015). “Messy Methods: Queer Methodological Approaches to Researching Social Media.” Computers & Composition, 40, 60–72. John Law. (2003). “Making a Mess with Method.” Published by the Centre for Science Studies, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YN, UK. Elaine Chun, “The Meaning of Ching-Chong: Language, Racism, and Response in New Media.” In H. Samy Alim, Arnetha F. Ball & John R. Rickford (eds.). Raciolinguistics: How Language Shapes Our Ideas About Race, 81-96. New York: Oxford University Press. John R. Gallagher. (2019). “A Framework for Internet Case Study Methodology in Writing Studies.” Computers & Composition, 54.

0:00-15:00 - the word "sense" - Deleuze on Carroll (vs. Derrida on Austin) - selective reading 15:00-25:00 - denotation (against formal logic) - subjectivity and non-subjective desire 25:00-44:00 - summarizing vs. intervening - subjective unity/failure to totalize (refrain) - causality vs association 44:00-55:00 - parataxis vs. hypotaxis - what teaching is - imposter syndrome and expertise 55:00-end - Isocrates - corporate "thinking outside the box"

We are going to continue with our exploration into the history of education for this episode. Although we have some more teacher stories, interviews, and big ideas to share very soon, I figure that as we are on a roll, we should do what we can to do the topic justice.   This podcast is available in iTunes, Google, Spotify, and many other pod catchers. Subscribe with this URL: https://feed.podbean.com/teatimeteaching/feed.xml Part one: Before we can discuss the history of education in Ancient Greece, we first must define where end when we are talking about. When we talk about Ancient Greece, we are referring to the civilizations, states, and people who inhabited the Greek peninsula and islands of the Aegean from around the 12th century BCE to the 6th Century AD. During this time, there were several epochs, or ages. The earliest evidence we have of civilizations in the area is from around 12th century BCE with the Minoan civilization. If you are familiar with the stories of the Iliad and the Odyssey, they come from this era. The Mycenean civilization was a literate and complex one, but when it collapsed – and we are not sure how exactly, although natural disaster is likely – so was their writing. What was left behind were a scattering of smaller villages, towns, and cities, usually on the coast, and reliant on trade with other Mediterranean civilizations. This period between the 8th century BCE, and the 6th Century BCE is sometimes referred to as the Greek Dark Ages. Over this time, the city states, evolved into their own systems, referred to themselves as Polis, and borrowed and adapted the Phoenician alphabet into what we recognize as Greek. With a script in place, knowledge began to be written down again, and so we have our first historian Herodotus wrote between the 450s and 420s BCE, and his tradition was followed by such as Thucydides, Xenophon, Demosthenes, Plato and Aristotle. One of the things we need to be aware of when we talk about Ancient Greece is that we are not referring to one Empire or political entity. Effectively Greece was a collection of independent city states geographically cut off from one another by mountains and the sea. It is through trade that knowledge was passed, and ideas spread, but effectively we are talking about areas which evolved their own laws and traditions – for example, Athens, Sparta, Thebes, and Macedonia. I could spend hours talking about ancient Greece, but we need to focus on our main question. What was education like in classical Greece? There were some general similarities between city states in Ancient Greece. For example, by the 5th Century BCE there was some “democratization” of education. Most free males could go to a public school, referred to as a gymnasium, while wealthy young men were educated at home by a private tutor. How you were education was a central component of your identity. For example, we know that Alexander the Great was tutored by Aristotle. For most Greeks, education reflected your social status and who you were as a person. We have a similar attitude today, often asking folks where they went to college, or who conferred their degree, as a sign of status and rank. You will notice that slaves did not have access to an education (in some city-states, slaves were forbidden), and women did not get a formal education (although this varied from city state to city state). In Athens, until about 420BCE, every free male received an elementary education. This was split into two parts – physical and intellectual. The physical aspect, “gymnastike” prepared citizens for their military service – they were taught strength, stamina, and military tactics. For Athenians, physical fitness was important for both aesthetic and practical reasons. Training was conducted in a “gymnasium” (a word still used to describe some elementary schools in this area today). The intellectual aspect, “mousike” was a combination of music, dance, lyrics, and poetry. Students learned to write with a stylus on wax tablets. When students were ready, they would read, memorize, and recite legends and Homeric stories. In this period, once a boy reached adolescence, his formal education ended. Around 420 BCE, we begin to see Higher Education in Athens. Philosophers such as Socrates, along with the sophistic movement led to an influx of teachers from all over the Mediterranean. It became fashionable to value intellectual ability over military prowess. This causes a clash between traditionalist, who feared that intellectuals would destroy Athenian culture and lead to a military disadvantage, while sophists believed that education could be a tool to develop the whole man, including his intellect, and therefore move Athens forward. (I'm sure you can think of similar arguments between traditionalists and progressives today – some things never change). Anyway, the demand for higher education continued and we begin to see more focused areas of study – mathematics, astronomy, harmonics, and dialectic – all with the aim of developing a philosophical insight. For these Athenians, individuals should use knowledge within a framework of logic and reason – what we call today – critical thinking. However, this level of education was not democratized. Wealth determined your level of education in ancient Athens. These formal programs were taught by sophists who charged for their teaching and advertised for their services, more customers meant more money could be made. So, if you were a free peasant, your access to higher education was limited (something that also resonates today), while women and slaves were excluded from this process altogether. Women were considered socially inferior in Athens and incapable of acting at a high intellectual capacity, while it was dangerous to educate slaves, and in Athens, illegal. Part Two: So, who were the sophists? Let's begin with the most famous – Socrates, or as Bill and Ted call him Socrates. Now the problem with learning about Socrates is that he didn't write anything down himself. Indeed, most of what we learn about him comes from two of his students: Plato, and Xenophon. Some of their writings about Socrates, particularly Plato's often contradict themselves. But generally, he is considered the father of philosophy. He advocated that a good man pursues virtue over material wealth, and he mused upon the idea of wisdom. The story goes that he decided to ask every wise man about what they know, and he found that they thought themselves wise,  yet they were not, while Socrates himself knew that he was not wise at all, which paradoxically, made him wiser since he was the only person aware of his own ignorance. This stance threatened the status of the most powerful Athenians, so he was eventually tried and when asked what his punishment should be, he proposed free dinners for the rest of his life, as his position as someone who questions Athens into action and progress should be rewarded. Unfortunately, Athenians didn't see it that way, and he was found guilty of corrupting the minds of the youth of Athens, and of “impiety” (not believing in the official gods of the state). As punishment he was sentenced to death by poisoning. Again – we see a similar theme in today's educational debate, where educational stances that encourage students to question the status quo and take a critical stance are considered threatening to those in power. Some things just don't change, do they? Isocrates was a student of Socrates who founded a school of Rhetoric around 393BCE. He believed education's purpose was to produce civic efficiency and political leadership, therefore the ability to speak well and be persuasive was the cornerstone of his approach. While his students didn't have to write 5 paragraph persuasive essays, you can see this approach in modern day social studies classes as well as middle and high school English curricula. Plato, on the other hand, travelled for ten years after Socrates' execution, returning to establish his Academy, named after the Greek hero Akedemos, in 387 BCE. He believed that education could produce citizens who could cooperate and members of a civic society (like the aims of 19th and 20th century public educators). His curriculum focused on Civic Virtue. The idea that a good citizen would act for the common good, at the expense of their individual gains. In his work “the Republic” he outlines that everyone needs an elementary education in music, poetry, and physical training, two to three years of military training, ten years of mathematics science, five years of dialectic training, and 15 years of practical political training. Those who could attain all that knowledge would become “philosopher kings”, the leaders in his ideal society. Aristotle was a student of Plato, learning in his academy for 19 years. When Plato died, her travelled until he was invited by Philip of Macedon to educate his 13-year-old son, Alexander (later the Great). In 352 BCE he moved back to Athens to open his school, the Lyceum. Aristotle's approach was based around research. There was systemic approach to the collection of information, and a new focus on empirical methods, like what we see as the foundation of our modern research methods. So, these were the developments in Athens, however, this was not the same for all of Greece. Whereas the Athenian system evolved away from a focus on preparation of male citizens for military service, Spartan society kept military superiority as the focus for its education system. Education in Sparta was focused around what we would probably call a military academy system – called “agoge” in Greek. In general, all Spartan males (except for the first born of the two ruling houses), went through a system which cultivated loyalty to Sparta through military training, hardships, hunting, dancing, singing, and social preparation. It was divided in three age groups, young children, adolescents, and young adults. Spartan girls did not get the same education, although we think there was a formal system for them too. The three age categories were the paides (7-14), paidiskoi (15-19) and the hebontes (20-29). Within these age groups boys were divided in to agelai (herds) with whom they would sleep (consider these like a house system in British private schools, or the Harry Potter stories). They answered to an older boy, and an official who was the paidonomous, or “boy-herder). So, the Paides, were taught the basics of reading and writing, but the focus was on their athletic ability. They did running and wrestling, they were encouraged to steal their food, but according to Xenophon, if they were caught, they were punished. Boys participated in the agoge in bare feet, to toughen them up, and at the age of 12 were allowed one item of clothing, a cloak, per year. Around the age of 12, a boy would gain a mentor who was an older warrior, called the “erastes”. As the boy transitioned into the Paidiskoi, so the mentor would act as a sponsor, while the student further developed his physical and athletic training. By the age of 20, the young Spartan graduated from the paidiskoi into the hebontes. If he had developed leadership qualities, these would be rewarded. At this stage, they were considered adults, they were eligible for military service, and could vote in the assembly, although they were not yet full free citizens. By 30 a Spartan man should have graduated, been accepted into the military, and was permitted to marry. He would also be allocated an allotment of land. This state education system not only prepared Spartan men for war, but also instilled a strong Spartan identity. They were away from their families for most of their childhood and this likely instilled a sense of favoring the needs of the collective over themselves as individuals or their own families. Indeed, the legend of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae clearly illustrates this concept of individual sacrifice for the collective good. This Spartan education provides a contrast to Athenian education. In Sparta education was state sponsored, designed to create a citizen who put the collective first. In Athens, higher education was private, and intended to create a citizen who put the collective first by way of virtue. However, Plato intended only a select few to be philosopher-kings, while Sparta expected everyone to be a military citizen. There is one other aspect of Ancient Greek education that I want to talk about. The symposium. In ancient Greece this was a part of the banquet that took place after the meal, where men would retire to the andron (men's quarters) recline of couches, and drink, and be entertained, and discuss a multitude of topics. While these were the precursors to the drinking parties that we associate with Ancient Rome, I can see many parallels with academic conferences in the modern day, where scholars share their research in a common location, eat and drink together, and find excuses to sample local entertainments. Of course, the pandemic has curtailed many of these activities, but one day we might be able to meet and talk in person again.  One thing we all have in common is that we've been to school. So, if you would like to contribute to the pod in any way, if you have a story to share, long, short, tragic, or comic, if you have comments to make about the podcast, or just want to say “hi”, you can send an email to TeachersTeaTimePod@gmail.com or alternatively you can send emails to me directly using mark@edjacent.org I love to read what you have to say. If social media is your thing, you can follow me on Twitter @markdiacop. You can find our contact information, copies of the show notes, and you can download previous episodes of the podcast at www.teachersteatimepod.com The podcast artwork was created by Phaedra. Opening and closing music is by Bryan Boyko.   Part One:  Before we can discuss the history of education in Ancient Greece, we first must define where end when we are talking about. When we talk about Ancient Greece, we are referring to the civilizations, states, and people who inhabited the Greek peninsula and islands of the Aegean from around the 12th century BCE to the 6th Century AD. During this time, there were several epochs, or ages. The earliest evidence we have of civilizations in the area is from around 12th century BCE with the Minoan civilization. If you are familiar with the stories of the Iliad and the Odyssey, they come from this era. The Mycenean civilization was a literate and complex one, but when it collapsed – and we are not sure how exactly, although natural disaster is likely – so was their writing. What was left behind were a scattering of smaller villages, towns, and cities, usually on the coast, and reliant on trade with other Mediterranean civilizations. This period between the 8th century BCE, and the 6th Century BCE is sometimes referred to as the Greek Dark Ages. Over this time, the city states, evolved into their own systems, referred to themselves as Polis, and borrowed and adapted the Phoenician alphabet into what we recognize as Greek. With a script in place, knowledge began to be written down again, and so we have our first historian Herodotus wrote between the 450s and 420s BCE, and his tradition was followed by such as Thucydides, Xenophon, Demosthenes, Plato and Aristotle. One of the things we need to be aware of when we talk about Ancient Greece is that we are not referring to one Empire or political entity. Effectively Greece was a collection of independent city states geographically cut off from one another by mountains and the sea. It is through trade that knowledge was passed, and ideas spread, but effectively we are talking about areas which evolved their own laws and traditions – for example, Athens, Sparta, Thebes, and Macedonia. I could spend hours talking about ancient Greece, but we need to focus on our main question. What was education like in classical Greece? There were some general similarities between city states in Ancient Greece. For example, by the 5th Century BCE there was some “democratization” of education. Most free males could go to a public school, referred to as a gymnasium, while wealthy young men were educated at home by a private tutor. How you were education was a central component of your identity. For example, we know that Alexander the Great was tutored by Aristotle. For most Greeks, education reflected your social status and who you were as a person. We have a similar attitude today, often asking folks where they went to college, or who conferred their degree, as a sign of status and rank. You will notice that slaves did not have access to an education (in some city-states, slaves were forbidden), and women did not get a formal education (although this varied from city state to city state). In Athens, until about 420BCE, every free male received an elementary education. This was split into two parts – physical and intellectual. The physical aspect, “gymnastike” prepared citizens for their military service – they were taught strength, stamina, and military tactics. For Athenians, physical fitness was important for both aesthetic and practical reasons. Training was conducted in a “gymnasium” (a word still used to describe some elementary schools in this area today). The intellectual aspect, “mousike” was a combination of music, dance, lyrics, and poetry. Students learned to write with a stylus on wax tablets. When students were ready, they would read, memorize, and recite legends and Homeric stories. In this period, once a boy reached adolescence, his formal education ended. Around 420 BCE, we begin to see Higher Education in Athens. Philosophers such as Socrates, along with the sophistic movement led to an influx of teachers from all over the Mediterranean. It became fashionable to value intellectual ability over military prowess. This causes a clash between traditionalist, who feared that intellectuals would destroy Athenian culture and lead to a military disadvantage, while sophists believed that education could be a tool to develop the whole man, including his intellect, and therefore move Athens forward. (I'm sure you can think of similar arguments between traditionalists and progressives today – some things never change). Anyway, the demand for higher education continued and we begin to see more focused areas of study – mathematics, astronomy, harmonics, and dialectic – all with the aim of developing a philosophical insight. For these Athenians, individuals should use knowledge within a framework of logic and reason – what we call today – critical thinking. However, this level of education was not democratized. Wealth determined your level of education in ancient Athens. These formal programs were taught by sophists who charged for their teaching and advertised for their services, more customers meant more money could be made. So, if you were a free peasant, your access to higher education was limited (something that also resonates today), while women and slaves were excluded from this process altogether. Women were considered socially inferior in Athens and incapable of acting at a high intellectual capacity, while it was dangerous to educate slaves, and in Athens, illegal. Part Two: So, who were the sophists? Let's begin with the most famous – Socrates, or as Bill and Ted call him Socrates. Now the problem with learning about Socrates is that he didn't write anything down himself. Indeed, most of what we learn about him comes from two of his students: Plato, and Xenophon. Some of their writings about Socrates, particularly Plato's often contradict themselves. But generally, he is considered the father of philosophy. He advocated that a good man pursues virtue over material wealth, and he mused upon the idea of wisdom. The story goes that he decided to ask every wise man about what they know, and he found that they thought themselves wise,  yet they were not, while Socrates himself knew that he was not wise at all, which paradoxically, made him wiser since he was the only person aware of his own ignorance. This stance threatened the status of the most powerful Athenians, so he was eventually tried and when asked what his punishment should be, he proposed free dinners for the rest of his life, as his position as someone who questions Athens into action and progress should be rewarded. Unfortunately, Athenians didn't see it that way, and he was found guilty of corrupting the minds of the youth of Athens, and of “impiety” (not believing in the official gods of the state). As punishment he was sentenced to death by poisoning. Again – we see a similar theme in today's educational debate, where educational stances that encourage students to question the status quo and take a critical stance are considered threatening to those in power. Some things just don't change, do they? Isocrates was a student of Socrates who founded a school of Rhetoric around 393BCE. He believed education's purpose was to produce civic efficiency and political leadership, therefore the ability to speak well and be persuasive was the cornerstone of his approach. While his students didn't have to write 5 paragraph persuasive essays, you can see this approach in modern day social studies classes as well as middle and high school English curricula. Plato, on the other hand, travelled for ten years after Socrates' execution, returning to establish his Academy, named after the Greek hero Akedemos, in 387 BCE. He believed that education could produce citizens who could cooperate and members of a civic society (like the aims of 19th and 20th century public educators). His curriculum focused on Civic Virtue. The idea that a good citizen would act for the common good, at the expense of their individual gains. In his work “the Republic” he outlines that everyone needs an elementary education in music, poetry, and physical training, two to three years of military training, ten years of mathematics science, five years of dialectic training, and 15 years of practical political training. Those who could attain all that knowledge would become “philosopher kings”, the leaders in his ideal society. Aristotle was a student of Plato, learning in his academy for 19 years. When Plato died, her travelled until he was invited by Philip of Macedon to educate his 13-year-old son, Alexander (later the Great). In 352 BCE he moved back to Athens to open his school, the Lyceum. Aristotle's approach was based around research. There was systemic approach to the collection of information, and a new focus on empirical methods, like what we see as the foundation of our modern research methods. So, these were the developments in Athens, however, this was not the same for all of Greece. Whereas the Athenian system evolved away from a focus on preparation of male citizens for military service, Spartan society kept military superiority as the focus for its education system. Education in Sparta was focused around what we would probably call a military academy system – called “agoge” in Greek. In general, all Spartan males (except for the first born of the two ruling houses), went through a system which cultivated loyalty to Sparta through military training, hardships, hunting, dancing, singing, and social preparation. It was divided in three age groups, young children, adolescents, and young adults. Spartan girls did not get the same education, although we think there was a formal system for them too. The three age categories were the paides (7-14), paidiskoi (15-19) and the hebontes (20-29). Within these age groups boys were divided in to agelai (herds) with whom they would sleep (consider these like a house system in British private schools, or the Harry Potter stories). They answered to an older boy, and an official who was the paidonomous, or “boy-herder). So, the Paides, were taught the basics of reading and writing, but the focus was on their athletic ability. They did running and wrestling, they were encouraged to steal their food, but according to Xenophon, if they were caught, they were punished. Boys participated in the agoge in bare feet, to toughen them up, and at the age of 12 were allowed one item of clothing, a cloak, per year. Around the age of 12, a boy would gain a mentor who was an older warrior, called the “erastes”. As the boy transitioned into the Paidiskoi, so the mentor would act as a sponsor, while the student further developed his physical and athletic training. By the age of 20, the young Spartan graduated from the paidiskoi into the hebontes. If he had developed leadership qualities, these would be rewarded. At this stage, they were considered adults, they were eligible for military service, and could vote in the assembly, although they were not yet full free citizens. By 30 a Spartan man should have graduated, been accepted into the military, and was permitted to marry. He would also be allocated an allotment of land. This state education system not only prepared Spartan men for war, but also instilled a strong Spartan identity. They were away from their families for most of their childhood and this likely instilled a sense of favoring the needs of the collective over themselves as individuals or their own families. Indeed, the legend of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae clearly illustrates this concept of individual sacrifice for the collective good. This Spartan education provides a contrast to Athenian education. In Sparta education was state sponsored, designed to create a citizen who put the collective first. In Athens, higher education was private, and intended to create a citizen who put the collective first by way of virtue. However, Plato intended only a select few to be philosopher-kings, while Sparta expected everyone to be a military citizen. There is one other aspect of Ancient Greek education that I want to talk about. The symposium. In ancient Greece this was a part of the banquet that took place after the meal, where men would retire to the andron (men's quarters) recline of couches, and drink, and be entertained, and discuss a multitude of topics. While these were the precursors to the drinking parties that we associate with Ancient Rome, I can see many parallels with academic conferences in the modern day, where scholars share their research in a common location, eat and drink together, and find excuses to sample local entertainments. Of course, the pandemic has curtailed many of these activities, but one day we might be able to meet and talk in person again.   

Cicero called Isocrates "the father of eloquence" and said that from his school proceeded giants who had an enormous influence on Athenian society and Greek culture, but he is often overlooked in histories of rhetoric and philosophy. In this episode, Richard Enos and David Isaksen discuss his contributions to the philosophy and teaching of rhetoric. Positioning himself between the philosophers and the sophists, Isocrates developed a school of wisdom joined with eloquence for the benefit of a democratic society.

In the 16th century as Shakespeare was writing plays like Alls Well That Ends Well, Hamlet, and Julius Caesar, Shakespeare turned to classical philosophers like Cicero and Isocrates to find tales exploring not only what constituted decent, or proper behavior, but what happened to people when those invisible rules of decorum were altered or violated. We’ve long lauded Shakespeare for including the works of famous Latin and Greek poets in his stories, but as our guest this week, Scott Newstok, is here to share, Shakespeare was doing more than simply building on the stories he found from the past. The ideas of Cicero and Isocrates concerning what it meant to “fit” a word to the action or an action to the word was built into the fabric of who the early modern playwrights were as artists, as well as an accepted cultural perspective from the 16th century that believed people, ideas, words, and even their clothing ought to fit together properly. Intriguingly, many of these playwrights came came from craftsmen background with Shakespeare being born to a glover and Marlowe being born to a shoemaker, playwrights like Shakespeare and his contemporaries were applying to their craft what they knew to be true about art--that the details needed to fit the scene where they were being used. This approach was not only standard industry practice in the Renaissance theater, but the culture of the audience themselves would have considered taking care to make proper connections between character, actor, and outfit in performances to be what Scott Newstok calls “fitting” to the times. Scott Newstok is the author of How to Think Like Shakespeare, and he joins us this week to explore his chapter of that book called “Of Fit” where he explores the historical and culture context of Shakespeare’s plays, including the idea that for Shakespeare, precision with words, actions, and even costumes, was as much a well established professional standard as it was creative genius.

TOPICS: Reshaping the courts, the lack of preparedness of U.S. health agencies, Isocrates & rhetoric, and preventing sexual exploitation. Host Scot Bertram talks with Adam Carrington, assistant professor of politics at Hillsdale College, about what it means when we say President Trump is "reshaping the courts." We share portions of a lecture from Mark Hemingway of RealClearInvestigations on the lack of preparedness of U.S. health agencies when it came to COVID-19. Ethan Stoneman, from Hillsdale's Rhetoric and Public Address department, discusses Isocrates and rhetoric. And Haley McNamara, a 2015 graduate of the College, talks about her experience at Hillsdale and her work with the National Center on Sexual Exploitation.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

TOPICS: Reshaping the courts, the lack of preparedness of U.S. health agencies, Isocrates & rhetoric, and preventing sexual exploitation. Host Scot Bertram talks with Adam Carrington, assistant professor of politics at Hillsdale College, about what it means when we say President Trump is "reshaping the courts." We share portions of a lecture from Mark Hemingway of RealClearInvestigations on the lack of preparedness of U.S. health agencies when it came to COVID-19. Ethan Stoneman, from Hillsdale's Rhetoric and Public Address department, discusses Isocrates and rhetoric. And Haley McNamara, a 2015 graduate of the College, talks about her experience at Hillsdale and her work with the National Center on Sexual Exploitation.

Edmund and Benjamin explore rhetoric, drawing on a variety of Greek thinkers. The Greek theorists' attitudes to rhetoric stem from their attitudes to knowledge. Is the crowd wise? Can rhetoric share wisdom with the crowd? Or is rhetoric where wisdom comes to die? https://www.patreon.com/politicaltheory101

About the Lecture: “Our democracy is getting self-destroyed, for it abused the rights of freedom and of equality; for it taught the citizens to regard insolence as a right, illegality as freedom, impertinence as equality, and anarchy as happiness.” (Isocrates, 436-338 BC). Democracy first emerged in ancient Athens in 507 BC following a long turbulent period of aristocracy and tyranny, when a nexus of intertwined geopolitical, sociopolitical, economic, and cultural developments led to the morphogenesis of this new political constitution. Athenian Democracy formulated the political ideology and fundamental principles that were later canonized by modern democracies, formalized defensive mechanisms against undue concentration of power and employed innovative integrative mechanisms to propagate its ideology and educate the citizens. Pathogenic traits-catalysts, however, such as the extreme polarization between mass and elite, demagogy, populism, failure of justice, apathy, and poor education caused extensive political ankylosis. Internal corrosion and changing historical conditions caused the decline and fall of Democracy three centuries later. Isocrates' aphorism, therefore, rings alarmingly all too pragmatic and relevant today, 250 years since the resurgence of Democracy in the modern world (USA, France, Greece). Are we running a similar cycle, repeating old mistakes, standing at the same juncture, heading towards the same dead end? To navigate forward, find solutions, and shape our future, we need first to study our past. About the Speaker: Born in Greece, Christofilis Maggidis received a thorough education in the Classical Lyceum at the Anavryta Model School and went on to receive a B.A. in History and Archaeology (1988) from the University of Athens, where he was awarded several honorary distinctions and scholarships for excellence. He further pursued his graduate studies while on prestigious fellowships (Fulbright, William Penn, and Charles Williams Fellowships) and received his Ph.D. in Classical Archaeology (1994) from the University of Pennsylvania. He completed postdoctoral studies as a Fellow at Brown University (1997-1999) and a White-Levy Research Fellow at Harvard University (1999-2001). Christofilis has taught archaeology, ancient history, classics, and philosophy at Campus College and the University of Indianapolis, Athens. In 2001, Christofilis joined Dickinson College as the Christopher Roberts Professor of Archaeology in the Department of Archaeology, where he has been teaching courses in the art, architecture, and archaeology of the prehistoric Aegean, classical Greece, republican/imperial Rome, Egypt, the Near East (Mesopotamia and Anatolia), in ancient Greek religion and athletics, Athenian democracy, ancient burial customs, and ancient technology. Christofilis Maggidis is an active field archaeologist with long field experience since 1985 as a trench master and sector supervisor at major archaeological; he has served as Field Director of the Lower Town Excavation at Mycenae, Co-Director of the Mycenaean Spercheios-valley Archaeological Project, and Director of the Archaeogeophysical Survey of the Citadel of Glas. He was elected member of the Athens Archaeological Society in 1999 and President of the Mycenaean Foundation in 2013. His main research interests focus on Aegean Prehistory, but also include Classical Sculpture and Architecture, Archaeological Methodology and Interpretation. Christofilis has given 38 invited lectures and presented another 40 international conference papers worldwide. His publications comprise 23 articles, numerous excavation reports, and four forthcoming books: The Lower Town of Mycenae I: Archaeogeophysical Survey 2003-2013; The Lower Town of Mycenae II: Archaeological Excavations 2007-2013; The Palatial Workshops of Mycenae: The Artisans' Workshops and the House of; Mycenae Excavations: Building K.

In which we cap off last week by talking a little bit more about the origins of rhetoric and why it is so powerful. Unfortunately we weren't able to record as long of a podcast as we might like, but consider this a teaser for future content. Go to audibletrial.com/goodandbasic for a free audiobook and 1-month Audible membership! This is the book where I first found the phrase logos politikos. It's an excellent collection of essays about Greek rhetoric (Amazon affiliate link:) https://amzn.to/2YH1PZ7 This volume contains two of Isocrates' most important works, Antidosis and Against the Sophists Podcast: anchor.fm/goodandbasic Twitter: @goodandbasic Instagram: @good_and_basic Music credit: Spanish Summer from audionautix.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/goodandbasic/support

Exploring the idea of knowing the Truth and doing the Good, we focus this episode on the great rhetorician, Isocrates. Isocrates frames the student/teacher relationship in terms of forming an adult. We also talk about the differences in approaches between Plato and Isocrates and why they are both valuable. 

Don’t you love those group adventure movies? You know, the ones with a ragtag group of misfits who each have their special skill--Ocean’s 11, the Great Escape, Power Rangers? Rhetoric had that too and they were called the Canon of Ten of the Ten Attic Orators. Like most canonical lists, they weren’t clumped together until they well and dead. Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace compiled what’s called the Alexandrian Canon including these ten hotshots of the 5th and 4th century BCE. Later, a scholar who was probably not Plutarch, called the Psuedo-Plutarch, wrote “The Lives of the Ten Orators” to chronicle the Rat Pack of Classical Greek rhetoric. A couple of these ten will be familiar to you--Demosthenes and Isocrates. Demosthenes and Isocrates are like the George Clooney and Brad Pitt of the Ten Attic Orators, getting most of the screen time and most of the glory. We’ve have individual episodes on each of them as well as individual episodes on some of the works they’ve written. Mere Rhetoric isn’t alone in emphasizing these super stars of the Canon of Ten: the Psuedo Plutarch spends almost 3500 words on Demosthenes and a paltry 392 on Aeschines. So, to make it up to them, we’re going to dedicate eight episodes of Mere Rhetoric to the  other members of the Canon of Ten, the Bernie Macs and Casey Afflecks of Classical Greek Rhetoric.   And today we’re going to start with the anti-Demosthenes, Aeschines.   Aeschines hated Demosthenes. The most famous peice he ever wrote was a legal argument called Against Ctetisphon (k’tes-i-fawn), which really could have been “Against Demosthenes and His Stinkin’ Friend.”   First, some background. Aeschines came from a modest background. He wasn’t destitute, certainly but it is “generally doubted that his father could have afforded to provide him with an education in rhetoric” and he had to marry up to enter a public career (9). The Pseudo Plutarch describes him as “neither nobly born nor rich.”  Demosthenes, on the other hand, was born to privilege and had a first-rate education. Demosthenes was educated at the schools os Isocrates and maybe Plato; Aeschines was taught by someone named Leodamas, whose reputation in history is partially that he was a mathematician and partially that Plato may have taught him math. Not a particularly impressive training for a future political rhetor.   Aeschines was a good performer and did a stint as an actor, and while this wasn’t as shameful as it would become in later centuries, Demosthenes accuses Aeschines of being a bad actor, which is pretty shameful (10). Unlike Demosthenes, he never was a professional speechwriter--every speech we have is about his own political concerns, and all three of them may be all that there is to have--nothing seems to have been lost (12). The best of these three, “Against Ctetisphone,” requires a little political history.   Demosthenes, as we’ve discussed in our earlier episode, was a rabble rouser against King Philip, the father of Alexander the Great, and the aggressor of the Hellenistic cities like Athens. He defeated them and then ruled over them in something called the League of Corinth, sort of a loose confederation of vassal states. Demosthenes did not like that and called for activism, which was pretty popular. Aeschines on the other hand favored peace and capitulatoin with Macadonia and King Philip. He was badly let down, though, as were the rest of the pragmatists because they received no gains or special treatment from the partnership. Defiant Demosthenes gained all the cultural capital and Aeschines looked like a collaborator.   Demosthenes’ friend, Ctetisphon, seeks to give a public award to Demosthenes, kind of a lifetime acheivement award from the state, with some real money attached. This “Golden Crown” was a civic and almost religious honor : As Thomas Leland points out, “To give this transaction the greater solemnity, it was moved that the ceremony should be performed in the theatre of Bacchus during the festival held in honor of that god, when not only the Athenians, but other Greeks from all parts of the nation were assembled to see the tragedies exhibited in that festival.”  So everyone would be fawning over Demosthenes, not just the Athenians. Aeschines just can not. Ctesiphon gives public crown to Demosthenes, Aeschines brings suit against him, and, like an animal to a trap, Demosthenes shows up in person as a “speaker for Ctesiphon.”   So there you have it, head-to-head, Aeschines and Demosthenes in the courtroom arguing about whether Demosthenes is a public hero or an extravagant wastrel and war profiteer. Opposition political parties, opposite managerial styles, opposite backgrounds. You can kind of feel Aeschines boiling over in this oration. One scholar points out that “Against Ctesiphon” disorganized, uneven, although powerful in some places.”   But Aeschines makes three main claims that range from the reasonable to the vitriolic.   First off, there is the location. The law specifically says that the award is presented in assembly and nowhere else, certainly not at the theater! How humiliating, Aescheines says if “He confers this honor, not while the people are assembled, but while the new tragedies are exhibiting; not in the presence of the people, but of the Greeks; that they too may know on what kind of man our honors are conferred.”  Okay, I could see that.   Also, that the award being given to Demosthenes is a little preemptive. Aeschines complains about giving Demosthenes the crown--there hadn’t been a full investigation into his full character.   But finally, Aeschines says, the award is supposed to be for people who have excellent character and Demosthenes, he argues, is the opposite of excellent. He is not shy about it: “Say, then, Ctesiphon, when the most heinous instances of this man's baseness are so incontestably evident that his accuser exposes himself to the censure, not of advancing falsehoods, but of recurring to facts so long acknowledged and notorious, is he to be publicly honored, or to be branded with infamy? ”Demosthenes, as a senator, doesn’t acknowledge diplomats, and he led a lot of soldiers to their certain death in an ill-fated military campaign. Aeschines even attacks Demosthenes’ private life because “He who acts wickedly in private life cannot prove excellent in his public conduct: he who is base at home can never acquit himself with honor when sent to a strange country in a public character.”   At the beginning, he says,“An examination of Demosthenes’ life would be  too long a speech, why should I tell it all now…” then he does, tells tale of primary, nepotism, violence, heart of it though “the worst of the crimes” was his greed for a cut of the peace with Philip, benefitted from war profiteering and perjury, sacrificing the lives of the young soldiers “as yourselves whether the relatives of the dead will shed more teachers over the tragedies and sufferings of the heros that will be staged after this or at the city’s insensitivity” (152). He holds, even, his bad luck against him, because in ancient Greece, bad luck in a leader was as indefensible as stupidity.   Look, I’m team Demosthenes and fighting for independence is always going to sound better than capitulating to an occupying force and this speech is so venomous and spiteful that it’s hard not to just dismiss it because it is so angry, but Aeschines does make a lot of good points, and he’s mostly pointing out that we don’t make exceptions for Demosthenes, which could also be interpreted as “no one is above the law,” which I find quite reassuring. The law is a big deal for Aeschines--makes sense, this is a legal case, and he praises it throughout the speech. Aeschines proclaims how excellent the law is, how excellent the assembly is: “A noble institution this a truly noble institution, Athenians!” he declares.   I’m also sympathetic when Aeschines alleges the Demosthenes just wants to shut him up. “He compares me to the Sirens, whose purpose is not to delight their hearers, but to destroy them. Even so, if we are to believe him, my abilities in speaking, whether acquired by exercise or given by nature, all tend to the detriment of those who grant me their attention. I am bold to say that no man has a right to urge an allegation of this nature against me; for it is shameful in an accuser not to be able to establish his assertions with full proof.” You shouldn’t want to shut up your opposition--that leads to all kinds of tyrany.   But then again, Aeschines dishes it out again back at Demosthenes, “But when a man composed entirely of words, and these the bitterest and most pompously labored when he recurs to simplicity, to artless facts, who can endure it? He who is but an instrument, take away his tongue, and he is nothing.”   In the end, I think the jurors had the same unpleasant taste in their mouths that we do reading it--Aeschines comes across and a squirming, angry little man trying whatever he can to stop his wildly popular rival from getting praise. In the result of the trial, Ctesiphon was acquitted and Aeschines failed to get ⅕ of the votes. Aeschines was humiliated for having brought the lawsuit to the courts, and, because of the unsuccessful suit, he was slapped with a  “fine of 1000 drachmas and (probably) loss of the right to bring similar action again” to the court. Aeschines left Athens in shame, and ending up as a rhetoric teacher in Rhodes.  As a rhetoric teacher myself, I don’t think of this as that much of a crushing ignobility, and, really, history has looked fondly on him, including him, with his bitter enemy, on the list of the Ten Attic Orators.

In this week's episode of the Reimagining podcast, Brian Niece brings along Gandhi, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Albert Einstein, Victor Hugo, Immanuel Kant, Carl Sagan and others to catch some glimpses of humanity. The easiest way to get new episodes is to subscribe on iTunes now. Want to continue the discussion? Tweet your thoughts using #reimagining to @brianmniece. Follow our Facebook Page. Or email us questions and thoughts to Podcast@brianniece.com. Find Brian at www.brianniece.com. This podcast is supported entirely by our listeners. Find out how to be a major part of what we're doing at our Patreon page. Further Reading: Rudyard Kipling's The Light that Failed. Audio of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. Gutenberg text of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Overview of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man. An article on Xenophon. Various works by Isocrates. Credits: Interludes music - "My Mind Never Bends" by Derek Clegg; used by permission. Photography - Ronda Dickey.

Welcome to MR podcast for beginners and insiders about the people, terms and movements who have shaped rhetorical history. We’re beholden to the humanities media project at the university of Texas for support for this re-recording that sounds so good. And This is a re-recording, so recognize that it might not fit into a normal timeline. This was supposed to come after the Encomium ofHelen written by Gorgias. It’s a come back written by my favorite sophist--Isocrates.   Isocrates had a complaint that Gorgias has not written a true encomium, but an apologia--a defense. He only defended her actions as not her fault instead of saying what she was actually excellent at. Isocrates complains that the encomium of helen is flaky, like the encomiums of bees or salt that other sophist have written. And, like so many of us, he uses this technicality to fuel his own attempt. It kind of reminds me of the Phaedrus, where Socrates wants to correct the speech he has just heard from another sophist. Something about seeing something done wrong makes you want to do it right.   And Isocrates is certain that is has been done wrong. First lines of his encomium demonstrate that: “There are some who think it a great thing if they put forward an odd, paradoxical theme and can discuss it without giving offense” Complaints against the sophist especially gorgias--Isocrates was one of those people who thought Gorgias was disreputable, moving around all the time, proving impossibles all the time, and, damningly, a political.  “The most ridiculous thing of all is that they seek to persuade us through their speeches that they have knowledge of politics” (9).  Writing about trivial things means that people will listen, admire--but not debate. By taking novel topics instead of political, they are easily the best--like being the best player of Calvinball. Instead, Isocrates praises in a political vein, using Helen as a figure for a contemporary controversy. But he does so in a roundabout way.   So to praise Helen, starts by praising her absconder. He mentions himself that “it would not yet be clear whether my speech is in praise of Helen or a prosecution of theseus” (21) But he argues by association: those who are “loved and admired her were themselves more admirable than the rest” (22). So, that argument goes, those who wanted Helen were the best sort, so she was, by assoication, pretty great. There’s a lot of praise of Theseus here for a supposed praise of Helen, but the Theseus Isocrates paints is a hero, not just of himself, like Hercules was, but for the Greek people in general he “freed the inhabitants of the city from great fear and distress” (25) and “thought it was better to die than to live and rule a site that was compelled to pay such a sorrowful tribute to its enemies” (27). Theseus was a selfless, poltical heo who has “cirtue and soundness of mind … especially in his managment of the city. He saw that those who seek to rule the citizens by force became slaves to others and those who put others’ lives in danger live in fear themselves” (32-33).   Indeed, there’s so much civic love for Theseus here that you set the idea that Isocrates here isn’t just talking about fiction, or myth, or history , but politics. This is not just a fun triffle , a parodoxologia like where Gorgias made Helen a hero instead of a villian. this is not paignion, a fun peice of exhition. George Kenedy argues that Isocrates goes on at such great length about theseus because “theseus is worthy of Helen” and similarly “Athens is worth of the hegemony which it should take from Sparta” (81). In other words, The Helen is “in fact a clear statement of Isorates’ program of Panhellenism” (80)--a united federation of greek city states helmed by Athens.   The praise of Helen herself backs up this idea: “It is due to Helen that we are not the slaves of the barbarian” paraphrases Kennedy (82). Isocrates talks about Helen the way that 19th century americans talked about manifest destiny: “A longing for beautiful things,... is innate in us, and it has a strength greater than our other wishes” and “we enslave ourselves to such people with more pleasure than we rule others” (55-57). Helen wasn’t just beautiful--she was devine. She “acheive more than other mortals just as she excelled over them in appearances. Not only did she win immortality, but she also gained power equal to the gods’” (61). While Theseus was honored by association to be chosen to judge the gods, Helen was defied, and --and this is important for the political analogy--she was able to assist in the apotheiosis of Menelaisis and others.   In the end, Isocrates’ Helen is several things at once: it is a criticism of the Gorgias and the other traveling sophists, who made their living by proving the impossible in demonstration speeches that delighted and caused, to paraphrase Gorgias’ own words, amusement for the authors. He’s presenting a political tract, similar to the one in the PanAthenaicus, where he argues for a more involved Athenian hegemony in panhellenic unity. He’s also presenting a pedagogical advertisment: study with me, he says, and you’ll create real political speeches, not fluffy bits of taffy. At the end of the speech, ever the teacher, Isocrates says “If, then, some people wish to elaborate this material and expand on it, they will not lack material to stimulate their praise of Helen beyond what I have said, but they will find many original arguments to make about her”--yes, he’s setting up his potential students to use his encomium--a real encomium--as a model for their own, future, semi-scaffolded work.   If you have your own example of using your own writing to help your students learn about differnt genres, I’d love to hear about it. Send me an email at mererhetoricpodcast@gmail.com or get in contact how ever you’d like. I recently heard from Rik in Holland (which, incidentally is awesome) that he listens to the podcast on his commute to Groningen University and when he walks the dog, as well as using the podcast in his own classes. Rik! I love to listen to podcasts walking a dog, or commuting, so good on you! Rik also made a suggestion for a podcast on framing, and, by gum, that sounds great, so look forward to hearing about framing in the future, Rik and all the dog walkers and everyone no matter where they are or what they do while listening to Mere Rhetoric.    

Bootstraps, Victor Villanueva   What does a rhetorician look like? When you imagine a rhetorician, maybe you see some white-toga-ed Roman, crossing his legs under his seat, holding a stylus to his chin. Or maybe you imagine a tweedy early twentieth century rhetorician, shaking out a newspaper and frowning. Or maybe you even imagine a contemporary rhetorician, presenting at the Rhetoric Society of America in front of a powerpoint presentation. But here’s a question for you--did you imagine a white rhetorician?   Today on Mere Rhetoric, we talk about Victor Villanueva’s book Bootstraps: from an American Academic of Color, which interrogates our discipline’s white privilege and privileging. But before we get to that, let me start out by thanking some people. First off, much thanks to the Humanities Media Project at the University of Texas at Austin for supporting the show, including letting me record in this great recording booth with great people like Jacob here to record and edit. Also, thank you to everyone who took the time to leave a review of Mere Rhetoric on iTunes. Also thanks to my fiance Krystian for always believing in me. Know how you feel when you get written comments on end of semester evaluations? That’s how I feel everytime someone leaves a review. Finally, since I just came back from a conference where I got to meet some great people who like the podcast, I’d like to give a big shout out to Clancy Ratliff for showing me a great restaurant in Lafayette and her student Nolan, who let me jabber about the connections between creative writing and composition while he showed me where my next session was. If you have strong opinions about the best place to eat in your hometown, or if you have a suggestion for the next episode, why not drop us a line at mererhetoricpodcast@gmail.com? Okay, enough business--let’s get to it.   I first became aware of the racial imbalance in rhetoric at my first RSA conference. Sharon Crowley was giving one of the key addresses, talking about racism in our students, in our institutions, and at one point I looked around at the audience--and wondered about racism in our own field as well. There were a few black and brown faces, but almost everyone in the great hall was white. We couldn’t, I realized, talk about racism in our classrooms and our colleges without interrogating our own racial assumptions.   That’s exactly what Victor Villanueva sets out to do in Bootstraps. Villanueva is a hot shot rhetorician, by almost any standard possible. He’s received the David H Russell Award for Distinquished Research, the Exemplar Award and Scholarship in English and was Rhetorician of the Year in 1999. Side bar: I did not know there was an award for being Rhetorician of the Year. Somehow, I imagine a People Magazine spread like for Sexiest Man Alive, but with pictures of academics mid-gesture in a lecture or thoughtfully frowning at a computer. Villanueva has also published and edited over 80 books including the essential anthology Cross Talk in Composition and Rhetorics of the Americas: 3114 BCE to 2013 CE. Guy knows his stuff. When you are literally rhetorician of the year, you must be the quintessential rhetorician, confident and poised in your rhetoricianness.   You’d think so.   In Bootstraps, Puerto-Rico-born Villanueva weaves autobiography, scholarship and teacher research together into an exploration of how the academic world can seem uncomfortable and unwelcoming to academics of color. He himself, for his PhD and his 80 books, when he writes about himself in the third person “He still  suffers [the fear that he isn’t as smart as he thinks] today, thirty years later, PhD, publications and all… He has seen the liberal’s fear of being honest with people of color about their abilities; the fear of being considered a bigot .. He has seen that tokenism, even when well-motivated, even though somehow necessary, makes things seem equitable when they aren’t equitable at all… he always wonders if, maybe, he isn’t as smart as people think” (13).   Little commentary here: this feeling, like you don’t belong, is called impostor syndrome and it’s pernicious among graduate students, more especially people who already feel like they don’t belong, as Villaneauva says about his own PhD “I didn’t know what I was getting into, but knew I was getting into something not intended for the likes of me” (xv). I remember when I got accepted at the University of Texas at Austin, I had nightmares that I hadn’t been, in fact, accepted, but had been allowed to complete on a reality to show to gain entrance into UT Austin. “Who Wants to Be a Longhorn?” Other graduate students, professional athletes and actors, and anyone who feels like they got into something for which they secretly might not be qualified suffers from this feeling. We’ll talk about more impostor syndrome in another podcast, but for our purposes here, the key thing to remember is that academics of color, even when they are invited into programs and departments warmly can still doubt the sincerity of the welcome. They can doubt themselves, when the culture has been insisting for their whole lives that academia is “not intended for the likes” of them.      Villanueva’s education in the 60s certainly didn’t forsee a brilliant rhetoric academic career for little Victor. His first school that assumed that “you people need to learn a trade,” in the words of one of his teachers (3) and at the next one the PE teacher shouted “Go home and get a haircut! And don’t come back until you do!” So, he didn’t (38). Yeah, that’s right--Villanueva, probably one of the most important rhetorical authors of the later 20th century didn’t graduate high school, but the high schools he would have graduated perpetually underestimated him. Only through detours in the military did he finally come to Tacoma Community college: “I wanted to try my hand at college, go beyond the GED. But college scared me. I had been told long again that college wasn’t my lot” (66).   So I started this podcast talking about Sharon Crowley’s speech at RSA, and she shows up at a crucial point in Villaneuva’s life because it was Crowley, “the first person he had ever read who had written of the sophists--a bigshot” (118) who offered him a job. It’s not a happy ending though--material conditions are hard for any young academic and more especially those who don’t have large family resources.   One of the reasons why he had been underestimated is that he was a minority in the nation. That’s a word that’s hard to pin down or used too casually, but Villanueva makes a distinction between the immigrant and the minority: “We behave as if the minority problem where the immigrant problem,” (19) and all we need is to make the minority sound or act like the majority. “The difference between the immigrant and the minority amounts to the difference between immigration and colonization” (29). He tells the story of two of his students arguing about English’s role in the composition classroom. “Both are Latinos, Spanish speakers, but Martha is Colombian; Paul is Puerto Rican. Martha, the immigrant. Paul, the minority. Martha believes in the possibilities for complete structural assimilation; Paul is more cautious” (24). “The immigrant seeks to take on the culture of the majority,” he suggests, “and the majority, given certain preconditions, not leaves of which is displaying the language and dialect of the majority, accepts the immigrant. The minority, even when accepting the culture of the majority,is never wholly accepted. There is always a distance” (23).   “The code switcher is a rhetorical power player,” he quips, pointing to how bilinguals recognize intuitively the fluid nature of language, the rhetorical nuances that comes from understanding the inexact nature of self-translation (23).Villanueva points out that we often assume that cultural shifting happens naturally, without any work, when, in fact, it’s very hard to try to keep both of your identities as an other-American.   Villanueva tells of his own personal experience with assimilation when he was drilled into strict prescriptivist English as a young boy in Puerto Rico. He was criticised for speaking with an accent, but “there was no verbal deprivation at play, just a process that takes time, ‘interlanguage’ to use a sociological term” (32). Eventually he read and listened and spoke more in English until “the accent disappeared, and Spanish no longer came easily, sometimes going through French or through Latin in my head, the languages of my profession, searching for the Spanish with which to speak to my family. Assimilation” (33).   But it’s very difficult to try to be perfect at Spanish and perfect and English. “Biculturalism,” he writes, does not mean to me an equal ease with two cultures. That is an ideal. Rather, biculturalism means the tensions within, which are cause by being unable to deny the old, ot the new ...I resent the tension, that the ideal is not to be realized, that we cannot be the mosaic … nor can we be the melting pot if that were the preference” (39). Those old metaphors, the mosaic and the melting pot, don’t do enough to describe all of the cultures in the country and the complex ways those cultures relate.   The first step, it is implied, is just to make the implicit explicit and recognize that culture is necessarily complex and changing. “It is not enough to recognize and make explicit our cultures. We need to recognize cultures in the context of other cultures, since none of us can be monocultural in America. Mexican americans may have a culture in common with many Mexicans, say, but Mexican Americans also have a culture in common with fellow Americans” (57). It’s like the classic 1997 film Selena where Selena’s dad points out the frustration of trying to navigate two culture and two languages, “We have to be more Mexican than the Mexicans and more American than the Americans, both at the same time! It’s exhausting!”   Selena’s dad is right. It’s additionally important not to essentialize. “Puerto Ricans may be ‘Hispanics.’ Yet our history in general and our history as it pertains to the United States is very different from the histories of both the Mexican American and the Mexican” (57). These differences are sometimes bluntly painted over, through terms like Hispanic or even “minority.” Villanueva tells ruefully of being asked to review an article on Mexican rhetoric, even though he isn’t Mexican, but even if had been Puerto Rican rhetoric, he’s a classicist, working on the sophists. He knows about Isocrates best, so why would he be pigeonholed in this way?   If it’s not obvious by now, Villanueva is also heavily influenced by Marxist thought. He suggests that the ultimate goal of the field of Rhetoric and Composition is to develop the “organic intellectual,” a theory from Antonio Gramsci about the combination of personal experience and academic learning--much like the book Bootstraps itself. Don’t ever say Villanueva doesn’t practice what he preaches. The organic intellectual doesn’t stay in the ivory tower, but “is involved ‘in active participation in practical life’ … an intellectual liaison  between the groups seeking revolutionary change and the rest of civil society” (129).   This perspective should influence everything we do in our weird academic culture--the way we teach our classrooms and the things we research and publish, the way we structure our departments and graduate programs and admissions and graduation requirements.   Villanueva ends the book with a call that I find pretty darn stirring. I’ll give him the last word: “As our status as workers becomes more apparent and as we come more in contact with more of those who are intellectuals from non-traditional backgrounds, we find ourselves in a potentially decisive moment. The  moment is right for America’s intellectuals in traditional academic roles to help organize intellectuals recognize themselves as such and to begin to fuse with them--creating Gransmi’s new intellectuals” (138)

Welcome to MR, the podcast for beginners and insiders about the ideas, people and movements who have shaped rhetorical history. Today or rather, the day I wrote this, I got some bad news, so to make up for it, I get to talk about Jeffrey Walker, who is one of my favorite people ever, and I get to talk about one of my favorite books, too, his Genuine Teachers of This Art, subtitled Rhetorical Education in Antiquity.   Basically Walker’s arguing that rhetoric as a field is, at its very core, pedagogical. It’s not just practice of rhetoric or analysis of rhetoric, but that both of these really come into being through the teaching of rhetoric. As he says “by defining ‘the art of the rhetor” as the art of producing a rhetor, one puts the other definitions into relation. The pedagogical project sets the agenda for the critical-rheoretic one and determines the appropriate objects of study… Its pedagogical enterprise is what ultimately makes rhetoric rhetoric and not just a version of something else” (2-3).   Walker’s title comes from a line from Cicero’s dialogs on the orator. Antonius describes Isocrates’ subsequent rhetoric teachers as the “genuine teachers of this art” and Isocrates does feature heavily in how we think about rhetoric and the teaching of rhetoric.   At the center of this text, Walker does the incredible work of reverse engineering the techne or art of rhetoric that Isocrates may have written. We think Isocrates wrote such a treatise. Zosimus’s Life of Isocrates in the the fifth century wrote “It is said that Isocrates also wrote an art of rhetoric bu in the course of time it was lost” (qtd. 57) Cicero, too, and Quintilian, seem to take it for granted that Isocrates had a complete rhetoric treatise. We might, Walker points out, not impose our own publishing tradition on what this would look like. Isocrates’ treatise on rhetoric would be, like Aritotle’s probably was “a  ‘teacher’s manual’ or ‘toolbox’ containing an organized and thus memorizable and searchable, collection of ‘the things that can be taught’ and a stock of explanations and examples” (84).   Combining shorter pieces of Isocrates’ with cited fragments and other sources’ admiration, parody and allusion, Walker reconstructs what this lost document might look like. He suggests that by looking at, say, the legal arguments of Isocrates, you can see evidence of a “rudimentary stasis system”: did they do it? how bad was it? was it legal or right? if it was right was that because of advantage, honor or justice? Of course there’s a bunch of stylistic rules some of which seem uniquely suited to Greek language and culture. And, of course, imitation is paramount. Over all, it seems that Isocrates’ pedagogical philosophy “assumes an ideal student of ready which who can take the imprint of the stylistic models set before him and can quickly come to imitate and absorb them” (153).   One of the key pedagogical assignments, then, is declamation. We don’t think of performance and acting as part of rhetorical discovery, but back in Isocrates’ day,speaking was extremely important, and the old debate practice of speaking your opponents’ words was a key pedagocial practice. Not just your opponent, but just “others” with whom you may or may not agree, sort of playing a part and trying on an argument. Think of it a little as if you were doing mock trial back in high school and some peopel are given the role of defense counsil and some are prosecution and some are witnesses: you have the facts of the case, but then you play the role the best you can within that structure. It’s invention, but also acting and it can be an effective pedagogical tool. As Walker puts it “the student was(is) freed from the pressure to discover the ‘correct answer’” (198) and “because the the student is playing a role, his or her youthful ego is not at stake, and it is possible to both play with the lines or argument and to reflect on them as well” (199).   If you have a question about some of the verbs and pronouns used in those last quotes, it’s because Walker doesn’t just study this stuff--he teaches it. Since his whole argument is that rhetoric is about being a teacher, he doesn’t shy away from describing how contemporary first year composition can embrace “rhetoric [as] an art of cultivating a productive, performative capacity” and unabashedly declares that “Rhetorical scholarship that made no consequential difference to what rhetors/writers do, or to how rhetors/writers are trained, would have little point. Perhaps that is obvious. Yet it is easy to forget” (288). Man, I get chills reading those words. I should take a moment here to say that if you use rhetorical methods from the ancients, like closely imitating exemplors or trying on other arguments, why not shoot a line at Mere Rhetoricpodcast@gmail.com? I’d love to hear about it and maybe we could do an episode just on the history and benefit of, say, imitation or declamation.   Okay, here’s the last word from Dr. Walker, though “Ancient rhetorical education appealed to the desired that brought the motivated student to it and that persists today: the desire expressed by Isocrates’ students to say admirable things; or Plato’s Phaedrus’ remark that he would rather be eloquent like Lysias than rich; or Plato’s Hippocrates’ wish to learn to speak  ‘awesomely’ like Protagoras … Rhetoric, as a paideia, was a ‘sweet garden’ where the young could experience and enact such things as theater, as game, and in so doing could cultivate their dunamis for wise and eloquent speech, thought and writing in practical situations as well as develop an attachment to a dream paradigm of democratic civic life” (293-4)    

Hermogenes of Tarsus   Welcome to MR, the podcast for beginners and insiders about the ideas, people and movements who have shaped rhetorical history. I’m Mary Hedengren and today is a rebroadcast of an old episode, thanks to the Humanities Media Project here at the University of Texas. Hope you enjoy!   Hermogenes of Tarsus was a bit of a boy genius: he wrote many important rhetorical treatises (of which we only have sections) before he was 23 years old. And when Hermogenes was fifteen years old, in 176 AD, something remarkable happened. The philosopher emperor of the Roman empire, Marcus Aurelius himself, came to listen to him speak. This is all the more impressive because Hermogenes was of Tarsus, which, if you know your ancient geography well you’ll note is pretty far east from Rome. Marcus Aurelius heard him declaim and speak extemporaneously. “You see before you, Emporer,” Hermogenes reported said, “An orator who still needs an attendant to take him to school, an orator who still looks to come of age.” The emporer was duly impressed with the boy’s rhetorical powers and showered him with gifts and prizes   From such auspicious beginnings, things quickly went downhill fast for poor Hermogenses. While still young he lost his brilliant mind. It’s impossible to know for certain what led to Hermogenes’ deterioration. Some propose that it was a psychological breakdown from the stress of being such a shooting star, and certainly that sounds reasonable—once you’d declaimed for the emporer of the world, where do you go from there? Others suggest that there was a physiological reason, like meningitis from a bout of infectious disease or early onset dementia. Ancients as well as moderns were fascinated with how someone who showed so much promise could so quickly become the butt of cruel jokes. Antiochus the sophist once mocked approach of the once-brilliant Hermogenes: “Lo, here is one who was an old man among boys and now among the old is a but a boy.” Byzantine texts, who loved a local rhetorical hero, speculated that when he died that his heart was huge and…hairy. Do you remember that JK Rowling story about the hairy heart? Every time I think of Hermogenes I think of that. But let’s talk about his ideas instead of whether his heart could be hairy.   We actually know surprisingly little of Hermogenes’ works. We know a lot of rumor about how great he was, but of the five treatise under his name, only one and a half are likely to be genuinely his work. The one is called “On Types of Style” and in it Hermogenes describes seven types of style: Clarity, Grandeur, Beauty, Rapidity, Character, Sincerity and Force. Some of you who are familiar with your Roman or medeval rhetoric are maybe scratching your heads here—seven? Seven types of style? What ever happened to high, medium and low? And what the heck is “character?” These are legitimate questions. Remember two things: first this is the period of the Second Sophistic, when there’s a heightened interest in rhetoric and in Greek rhetoric in specific, so that means that people are looking for something a little more off the beaten path. Rhetoric plus. Instead of just aping Cicero, Hermogenes comes up with these seven categories that are more specific and less immediately associated with rhetorical situation. It’s like a more byzantine approach to style. And yes, that’s a Greek empire pun.   The other thing to remember about Hermogenes’ style guide is that he was probably a teenager when he wrote it. And a celebrated prodigy at that, so that just accelerates the cocky self-assuredness. Remember those kids in high school who insisted that they were smarter than all of the teachers and were pretty certain that they could be president—if they wanted to descend to politics? Yeah, Hermogenes was probably that kid.   Wow, it’s hard not to talk about Hermogenes the person instead of his ideas. He’s just an interesting guy. Okay, so these 7 kinds of style.   Clarity comes first because clarity is most critical. But don’t think that just because clarity is important that it’s simple. Oh no, clarity consists of two parts—purity, which is sentence-level clarity, and distinctness, which is about big-picture organization. So you need to have each sentence clear as well as the organization over all.   The next style point is grandeur. Oh, don’t wory, grandeur, too, has sub parts—six of them, arranged in 3 groups: solemnity and brilliance come first. Solemnity is using abstract statements about elevated topics. “Justice comes to all.” “Honor never tarnishes” “Love is a many-splendored thing.” Solemn statements are short, bold and unqualified. Brilliance takes those abstracts down to specifics, and becomes longer: “It’s good when two friends meet around the board of fellowship.” They may sound similar because they are pretty close.   The third part of grandeur is amplification. It’s not just talking a lot, but expanding the topic to make it seem “bigger” than it would be if discussed in casual conversation. Nuff said.   The last chunk of grandeur comprises three parts: aperity, vehemence and florescence. In short, sudden strong emotion. Asperity for shart criticism, vehemence for distaine and florescence to ease back off a bit and sugar coat the strong feelings.   Having done with grandeur, Hermogenes points out that beauty is also useful, although, surprisingly, he doesn’t break this category down too much.   The next type of style is rapidity—quick short sentence, rapid replied, sudden turns of thought in antithesis. “Am I happy? No. You disappoint me. No, you destroy me.” That sort of thing. The fifth style is that mysterious character. Strangely this is pretty muh what Aristotle calls ethos. You migh have to think a little abstractly about how character can be a style, but Hermogenes insists that this type of what we might classify as argument I actually a style. Okay. He’s the genius, not me. The subcategories of character are simplicity, sweetness, subtlety and modesty, which do sound a little more like something you can create in style.   Finally, Hermogenes recommends to us Sincerity. The speaker must let his audience know that he is “one plain-dealing man addressing another in whose judgement he has perfect confidence.” The idea is to create the illusion that the speaker is talking more or less extemporaneously. They can’t appear to be written into the speech or that ruins the whole effect. Imagine how different you feel when someone in the heat of a speech says, “Oh, I can’t stand it!” versus when you see written in the notes “Oh. I can’t stand it [with vehemence.]”   The last style is actually just the correct balance of all six of these types of style. By using these types of styles well, the speaker has force with his audience. He sums up “the ai of clarity is that the audience should understand what is said, whereas Grandeur is designed to impress them with what is said. Beutyf is designed to give pleasure. Speed to avoid boredome, ethods helps to win over the audience by allying them with the speaker’s customs and character and verity persuades them he is speaking the truth. Finally, Gravity sitrs up the audience and they are carried away by the completeness of the performance, not only to accept what they have heard, but to act upon it.”   If you’re curious about whether Hermogenes in thoughtfully preparing such a philsphy of style was adroit in it, the sad fact is that nothing in “On Style” suggests the boy rhetor who capitvated the emporer Marcus Aerlious. Translater Cecil W. Wooten says succinctly “he is a brilliant critic of style whose own style is really quite atrocious” (xvii)   In the same way that young Hermogenes took the basic divisions of style and expanded them, he did a very similar thing with the stases. We’ll talk more about the stases in a later podcast, but briefly, they’re a way of categorizing what it is you’re arguing about. Are you in conflict with your interlocutor about whether global warming exists or are you just debating what’s the correct policy to decrease warming emissions? In the stases of HermaGORAS ( who is not to be confused with our current hairy-hearted hero) and others throughout the classical world, there were four different stases: fact, definition, quality and procedure. Hundreds of years later, in the second sophistic, HermoGENES has expanded on these four. How much? Okay, fact, definition and procedure get to stay pretty much the same, but quality? Oh, quality gets blown up. Now instead of 4 stases we get—13. Yep, 13.   Hermogenes makes a big deal on whether an argument actually has issue—whether it can be argued about. Because, after all, he himself points out that “It is not the function of rhetoric to investigate what is really and universal just, honorable, etc.” but real, public issues. To have issue he set some requirements. All parties have persuasion that are (1) different and (2) have force. This means you can’t have straw men you’re fighting against The verdict is (1) not self-evident but (2) in principle can be reached . this means you can’t really argue whether chocolate or vanilla are better.   As the scholar Malcolm Heath has pointed out, this stuff was important for ancient rhetoric: “At the heart of ancient rhetoric in its mature form was a body of theory […] which sought to classify the different kinds of dispute […] and to develop effective strategies for handling each kind” (Heath). But classifying stases kind of lost its luster after the Renaissance. Heath’s translation and interest came as a result of work done by Kennedy (1983) and Russell (1983) opened up interest in Hermogenes again.   I think we’re primed for an increase in interest in the work Hermogenes, the boy wonder. I have to admit, though, the story of his life is especially touching to me. I can’t help but speculate what the young man would have achieved in his future if he had been able to continue to work and produce texts. Would he have expanded on other categories of ancient rhetoric? Would he have refined his definitions? It makes me remember the juvenile work of Cicero or Isocrates and wonder whether we’d honor them so highly if those were the only treatises we had from them. We’ll never know what Hermogenes could have become, what contributions he could have made in the second sophistic period, because his career was so tragically cut short before he could refine and develop his ideas.  

When you were learning math, I bet you didn’t start by trying to solve P versus NP. When you were learning Spanish, I bet you didn’t start with creating your own translation of Don Quixote. When you were learning to write, did you start with writing thirty-page rhetorical analyses and speeches? Probably not.   The ancient Greeks thought it was probably not such a good idea to start out young rhetors on writing full speeches, so they came up with a series of exercises that teachers could lead their students through, exercises that would help students become more comfortable with language, learn the conventions of their culture and generally ease their way into the kind of speech writing they’d be doing when they became generals and politicians and whatever else they were planning on doing when they grew up. These exercises were called progymnasmata, which mean “early exercises.” You may recognize that middle part as sounding like “gymnasium,” so it’s easy to remember what progymnasmata means—exercises.   Anciently, the two most used sequences were written by Hermogenes of Tarsus and Aphthonius of Antioch. And the order in which the progymnasmata were taught were usually the same, more or less: starting with fable, students then work through, chreia narrative, proverbs, refutations, confirmations, commonplaces, encomiums, vituperation, comparison, impersonation, description and only then on to theses and defending or attacking a law.   Some of these terms you might not be familiar with but pretty much the idea was to start with simple stories and move up to arguments. But—and I think this is important—stories were an argument. We do this all the time, don’t we? ? So, Eric, what’s one of your favorite fables that proves an argument?   [Eric does his thing] These stories are deeply resonate in our society’s memory and we can use them as an argument, assuming our audience agrees with these stories’ premises.   In the progymnasmata of Aelius theon, he explains the importance of “making clear the moral character inherent in the assignments” (13). Our society values something about the morals of Romeo and Juliet and the tortoise and the hare and so when we learn them and how to use them, we are underlining things our audience already buys into.   One step more abstract than fables are proverbs: “A penny saved is a penny earned”; “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander”; “If you build it, they will come.” We have many proverbs that exemplify what our society values—whether thrift, equality or building baseball stadiums for ghost players. When the ancient Greeks were educating their students about language and putting together arguments, they were also educating them in what kinds of arguments their society already believed in.   Chreias Krey-ya, which are maxims ascribed to a person, for example, not only tell the student what the society values, but also who the society values. Again, these are generally accepted societial values. For example, when people say, “When they were hanging Nathan Hale, he bravely declared, ‘I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country,’” they are not only affirming the value of patriotism, even martyerism, but they’re also saying that Nathan Hale, the Revolutionary spy, is the kind of guy that we should be listening to.   Older exercises take parts of a speech and go in depth like ekphrasis which describes something. Let’s describe this room: Go:   Another exercise, ethopoeia, takes it a step forward by encouraging students to write in someone else’s situation, “where someone is imagined as making a speech” as Hermogenes puts it, “For example, what would a general say when returning from a victory? … what would a general say to his army after a victory?” Farmer one, Dido, etc.   Encommium and invective involve praising or blaming a figure, usually someone everyone knows and on whom everyone has an opinion. Think of Gorgias’ famous “Encomium of Helen,” which tried to argue in favor of someone everyone hated, Helen of Troy, or Isocrates’ response in his own encomium. Usually, though, Encomiums and invectives were along the lines of what everyone already thought, but the rhetor’s challenge was to say something new.   Finally, students could work on thesis and antithesis Nicolaus the Sophis says that “Thesis is something admitting logical examination, but without persons or any circumstance at all being specified.” In other words, while students start with clear concrete stories and fables, they end being able to talk abstractly about frequently heard debates like “should a scholar marry?” or, to use ones more common in our day, “should we have the death penalty?” “is gun control moral?” “should abortion be legal?” or any of those other topics that you were probably assigned to debate in junior high. And just like in junior high, ancient greek students were expected to know how to debate both sides of the argument.   Once these progymnasmata were under the belt, so to speak, students could work on actual speeches with a context and an audience.   This method may seem a little old fashioned to modern pedagogies. In fact, yes, very old fashioned. These exercises continued not just in the ancient world, but into both Byzantine and Western Europe. The “themes” of the progymnasmata, argues Edward P. J. Corbett, had even more influence on “European schoolboys of the 15th and 16th centuries” than they did on Greek children. In fact, the idea that students need to first become conversant in parts before they can address the whole was later reformed into the “modes.” If you have a parent or grandparent of a certain age, you can ask them about writing modes and themes when they were growing up and they will tell you about having to write descriptions, narrations, and expositions before they were allowed to write arguments. Albert R. Kitzhaber chronicals the way that the modes became THE pedagogical tool for almost a hundred years here in the US, much as the progymnasmata dominated Europe for millennia. But Most compositionists these days say, “heck with prerequisites, get the students composing organically, making their first full attempts at a complete argument early, even if it means a short length or a superficial topic.” I’ve taught a class, for example, that begins with students ardently debating whether toilet paper should be hung over-hand or under-hand. This is probably the kind of education that you’ve had.   The progymnasmata, and in fact, the idea that there should be prerequisite writing exercises before argumentative writing, swings back and forth in pedagogy. Additionally, becaue the progymnasmata reflect societal values in their stories and common places, they can be seen as stifling individuality. George Kennedy points out that the progymnasmata “are open to criticism that they tended to indoctrinate students with traditional values “(x).   But the benefits of the progymnasmata have been appealing to modern composition scholars as well. Kennedy further says that “Nevertheless, it would be unfair to characterize the traditional exercises as inhibiting all criticism of traditional values. Indeed, a major feature of the exercises was stress on learning refutation or rebuttal: how to take a traditional tale, narrative, or thesis and argue against it. If anything, the exercises may have tended to encourage the idea that there was an equal amount to be said on two sides of any issue, a skill practiced at a later stage of education in dialectical debate."   Sharon Crowley and Deborah Hawhee point out that instead of giving students everything to do at once, the progymnasmata provide small exercises that lead to big results:” Each successive exercise uses a skill practiced in the preceding one, but each adds some new and more difficult composing task. Ancient teachers were fond of comparing the graded difficulty of the progymnasmata to the exercise used by Milo of Croton to gradually increase his strength: Milo lifted a calf each day. Each day the calf grew heavier, and each day his strength grew. He continued to lift the calf until it became a bull."   everything old is new again with the progymnasmata, and that’s a proverb that you can trust!

And today we have news: ast week something finally happened, something I always dreamed of, ever since I was 18 years old—I got called up for jury duty. I’m thrilled to be able to do my civic duty, not just because since I was 18 years old I’ve been mainlining old episodes of Law and Order, but also because because it gives me a front row seat to the world of forsensic rhetoric. Today on Mere rhetoric, we’re going to talk about the illustrious history of forsensic rhetoric. But first just a reminder that you can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, or follow us on twitter at mererhetoricked (that’s mererhetoric followed by a ked) or email us at mererhetoricpodcast@gmail.com.   Ok, so when we think about rhetoric, we often think of it as a foil to philosophy. Something completely unrelated to everyday life, abstract and smartsy-artsy. But for the ancient greeks, rhetoric was a cold, hard necessity. The Ancient Greeks of around 467 BC were a litigious group, constantly hauling each other into court. It was one of the great things about having such awell developed government, that you could drag your neighbor into court and get some money out of them. But in ancient Greece you didn’t have a professional corp of lawyers to fight your battles for you. If you were going to sue your neighbor, you were suing your neighbor and you had to make a case and that meant you had to give a good argument.   Rhetoric historian George A Kennedy even claims that rhetoric as an art arose because of this legal imperative. He writes, "Citizens found themselves involved in litigation... and were forced to take up their own cases before the courts. A few clever Sicilians developed simple techniques for effective presentation and argumentation in the law courts and taught them to others” "Anyone reading the classical rhetorics soon discovers that the branch of rhetoric that received the most attention was the judicial, the oratory of the courtroom. Litigations in court in Greece and Rome were an extremely common experience for even the ordinary free citizen--usually the male head of a household--and it was a rare citizen who did not go to court at least a half a dozen times during the course of his adult life. Moreover, the ordinary citizen was often expected to serve as his own advocate before a judge or jury. The ordinary citizen did not possess the comprehensive knowledge of the law and its technicalities that the professional lawyer did, but it was greatly to his advantage to have a general knowledge of the strategies of defense and prosecution. As a result the schools of rhetoric did a flourishing business in training the layperson to defend himself in court or to prosecute an offending neighbor." (Edward P.J. Corbett and Robert J. Connors   and so rhetoric came to the Greeks. Teaching other people how to argue their own cases was the first form of rhetorical education.   Eventually, the greeks came up with the idea of the logographer. So since you have to give your own case, the courts allowed you to get help from one and only one friend or relative….or professional ringer. The logographer would hear your case and write a speech written in your voice and then you would memorize the speech so that you could present it in court. People who knew you well might be surprised at how elquant and wise you sounded, but it might help you win the case after all.   Some of the best rhetoricians of the ancient world did stints as logographers. Demosthenes, the rabble-rouser who almost toppled Alexander the Great, was a logographer, as was the great rhetoric teacher Isocrates. Lysias, the orartor who inspired Plato’s Phaedrus, was a logographer, too, and Antiphon. So logography has a long and nobel tradition, even though it was, essentially like getting your speech written by a professional ringer. Arguments were made in the ancient world, like now, that there was something unfair about the way that rich people could buy the best defense. Many of the ancient complaints against rhetoric, like those made by Socrates in the gorgia, were against logographer’s ability to write as good of an argument against a position as for it. When a logographer could be hired for the defense or the prosecution, they weren’t perceived as sincere as someone who was arguing in court about their own life, property and freedom.     And what might go into Athenian forensic thetoric? What were those logographers writing? Well, to understand that, you have to understand a few things about Law and Order: Athens. First, this was a trial by jury, but it wasn’t necessary people like me getting called up for jury selection. People volunteered to be on a jury, because you did get paid. It wasn’t enough to volunteer, though you had to be selected. But sometimes it wasn’t necessarily selective. There could be hundreds of jurors on a jury—up to 500! And the jury had a lot of power—the judge didn’t decide the trial outcome at all, only the jury. So in appealing to a jury, you were appealing to a large group of people, a lot like making a political speech, really. In Athenian justice, reputation meant a lot to these juries, so many of the witnesses were just good and/or famous people brought it in say that they did or didn’t think the plaintiff did it—regardless of whether they were actually an eyewitness. It also helped to have some graphic description of the wrong done and make appeals to the common man—these jurors did want to be entertained while they decided after all.   Some great early pieces of rhetoric were, in fact, legal speeches. In some cases we don’t know whether these speeches were actually ever used in court or if they were used for demonstrating a logographer or rhetoric teacher’s ability. For example, Isocrates wrote “real” forensic pieces like “Against Lochites, Aegineticus, Against Euthynus, Trapeziticus, Span of Horses, and Callimachus.” Even though he always said that he wasn’t fit for the court. He may have been working as a logographer for someone else, or they might not have been cases that were actually tried. Some of these court cases are pretty crazy, showing how you didn’t have to be famous to sue someone. The speech against Lochites - where "a man of the people" irX1790vs is the speaker - exhibits much rhetorical skill. The speech about the horses concerns An Athenian citizen had complained that Alcibiades had robbed him of a team of four horses, and sues the statesman's son and namesake (who is the speaker) for their value.   Isocrates also wrote faux forencis speeches.“Against the Sophists” and “Antidosis” defend his character and profession against imaginary lawsuits. Forencis examples were common for a rhetorician to show off his capacities in what kind of defendents he could write for and one popular form of rhetoric was to write a defense of someone who isn’t actually going to see the inside of a court room, or to write a legal argument for a case long settled. Students of rhetoric, too, engaged in a lot of forensic rhetoric. The progymnasmata, or series of exercises used in training a young rhetor, included crucial steps of defending or protesting a law and writing definitions of what is and isn’t just. Forensic rhetoric drove rhetorical education forward.   Eventually legal speeches became a clear genre of rhetoric, one of several. By the time Aristotle writes On Rhetoric, legal, or forsencic rhetoric is, along with deliberartive and epideictic one of the three major categories of rhetoric that Artistotle classifies. Aristotle spends 6 chapter discussing forensic rhetoric. At the beginning he sets up the primary “means or persuasion” in forensic rhetoric. He suggests 3 things need to be considered: “1. For what purposes persons do wrong 2. How these persons are mentally disposed 3. What kind of persons they wrong and what these persons are like.” He also explores abstract ideas like what kind of wrongs are being done when someone breaks the law, and The Koinon of Degree of Magnitude"which states: "A wrong is greater insofar as it is caused by greater injustice. Thus the least wrong can sometimes be the greatest.” Pretty heady stuff.   If greeks were good at setting up legal rhetoric, the Romans took it to a new level. Romans love laws. Even more than laws, they love talking about laws: which ones are just, which ones are misinterpreted, which ones are being faunted. Arguably, arguing was their greatest art. One of the greasted of these contentious legal types of Cicero. In The orator Cicero emphasizes the importance of learning all of the ins and outs of the law if you want to become a rhetor, because it was assumed that you would be involved in the court system on one side or the other. Again, this was all personal—the idea of separate lawyers who represent you in court is only a few hundred years old.   So what does this have to do with what I’ll expect to see when I show up for jury duty? Well, I don’t think I’ll see the defendant and plantiff respresenting themselves, although they might, especially if this is one of those sweet small-claims deals. If not, there will be lawyers who rae taking the case not because of any great affection for the parties, but because they’re getting paid. And they will be making speeches, not because they have any great passion for it, but because they’re professionals good at what they do. Acutaly, if you think about the complaints that people make against lawyers in our society—that they’re insincere and slimy and only after the money—those are the same complainst people had of logographers and rhetors. The legal arguments I’ll hear will almost certainly invoke ideas of wrongdoing and talk about the character of the parties involved. And I and my five or eleven fellow jurors will get a say in justice, just like the hundreds of Athenian jurors back in the days of Isocrates.    

  Welcome to Mere Rhetoric the podcast for beginners and insiders about the people, ideas and movement that have shaped rhetorical history. I’m Mary Hedengren and   the University of Texas’ Humanities Media Project supports the podcast and     Today we’re doing a podcast on Dionysius of Halicarnassus, not least because it’s so fun to say his name. Some people just have the kind of name that makes you want to say it all out, in full. Say it with me: Dionysius of Halicarnassus. It’s lovely. Fortunately, we’ll lget to say Dionysius of Halicarnassus several times today.   Dionysius of Halicarnassus, being of Halicarnassus, was Greek, but he wasn’t one of the 5th century golden age Greek rhetoricians--he lived around 50-6 BC during the Roman empire. Indeed, he studied in Rome and gave lessons there as part of the Greek educational diaspora. Dionysius of Halicarnassus could be seen as a great reconsiler between Roman and Greek thought, or he could be seen as a stoolie for the romans. He wrote of the Romans as the heirs of Greek culture and was always talking up the qualities of the Romans.   But he did love Greek rhetoricians. He writes admiringlyof Greek poets like Homer and Sappho of Greek rhetoricians Isocrates and Lysius, and even of Dinarchus, whom most people thought was kind of a lousy rhetor and even Dionysius of Halicarnassus admits was “neither the inventor of an individual style … nor the perfector of styles whcih others had invented” (1). He compiledhis thoughts on rhetoric into a more-or-less treatise known to us rather unimaginatively as the Art of Rhetoric. Not to be confused with all of the other Arts of Rhetoric, but the one by Dionyius of Halicarnasus. In the Art of Rhetoric and On Literary Composition, he offers in-depth analysis of many of the greatest Greek rhetors and rhetoricians, giving long examples in his text. As a matter of fact, much of the fragments we have from folks like Sappho comes from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, because he loved to quote big chunks of text and then go back and describe what was happening in those texts, even down to the level of the sounds of the vowels. that’s the level of analysis you get from dionysius of Halicarnassus.   And rather not surprisingly. Dionysius of Halicarnassus cited big chunks of text because he was a firm believer of imitation. Imitation,in this case, wasn’t the same as mimesis. Let me describe the differences: For Aristotle, Mimesis was about looking to nature and imitation from nature. So you see a bowl of grapes, and you get your teeny, tiniest paintbrush and you paint thos grapes so realistically that someone walking by might jam their finger reaching out to grab one. that’s mimesis. Dionysian imitation, though, is about imitating an author. Or authors. So now instead of staring at a bowl of grapes, you might stare at a poem about a bowl of grapes. Pedagogically, you might first emulate the poem, trying to recreate the poem as closely as you can, then adapt the poem, maybe now instead of a poem about grapes you make it a poem about plums. then you might rework and improve the poem, cutting back the long winded parts, or where the original author used a lame analogy or something. But then, in your own work, you continue this process with not just one poem, but dozens of poems, and not just by one author, but by dozens of authors. Through careful reading and analysis, you can identify the styles and methods most appropriate to your situation. This was popular for the Romans and it’s popular with us. If you’re going to write a love poem today, for instance, you might write a sonnet because of the successful love poems of Plutarch and Shakespeare, and you might find yourself using similar kinds of tropes and figures as Plutarch and Shakespeare, cataloging the beauty of your beloved, or comparing them to an animal or flower.this is all Dionysian imitation on your part. The Dionysian imitation caught on in a big way among Latin writers. Quintilian was a fan and included imitation of authors in his own pedagogy. Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ 3-volume treatise, known to us as--surprise--on imitation became a relative best seller. It makes sense considering the politics of greco-roman relations: if the Golden Age rhetors, Isocrates and Lysius, really are teh best, they can serve as models for Roman writers. these Roman writers, though, can exceed the Greek models. Just like how Dionusus of Halicarnassus thought that Romans were the literal descendents of later Greeks, he found a way that their writing could be descended from Greek style.   It may sound weird to us to not value originality, but Romans were sort of world-weary, “nothing new to be said” sorts who recognized the long literary precedent of Greek and Egyptian writers. Dionysian imitation could give them a way to feel that they were taking this long history and improving on it. And that meant a lot to them.   If you, like Dionysius of Hallicarnassus, have a fun name to say, or if you know of a rhetorician who, like Dionysius of Hallicarnassus, has a fun name to say, why not drop us a line at mererhetoricpodcast@gmail.com? Until next time, Dionysius of Hallicarnassus.  

Aspasia   Welcome to Mere Rhetoric the podcast for beginners and insiders about the people, ideas and movement that have shaped rhetorical history. Big thanks to the University of Texas’ Humanities Media Project for supporting the podcast. Today we get to talk about a rhetorician who may have influenced everyone, or may not have even existed.     Aspasia is one of the most historically elusive, even mythical rhetoricians. As with Socrates, we only have second-hand accounts of her life and work, but unlike Socrates, she was a woman, which meant that much of the accounts we have of her are fragmented and often disparaging.   Aspasia is one of the few women from classical Athens who is listed by name and certainly one of the first female rhetoricians we have record of. What kind of rhetorician she was and how she was able to leave such a legacy is shrouded in jealousy, lies, and accusations. Anything we think we know about Aspasia has to be tempered by the historical circumstances of 5th century bc Athens.   And these were the circumstances for women in Classical Athenian life. If you were an upper-class woman, your life was circumscribe from birth. You were living cloistered in your father’s home until you married, quite young, to an older man. There was no real expectation for passion in marriage, and no sense of equal partnership. Your education was entirely within the home and your whole life was to be “daughter of a citizen and a citizen’s daughter.” Things were difference, however, if you were on the fringes of Athenian society, as Aspasia was.   Aspasia was a foreigner, the daughter of neither a citizen or a citizen’s daughter, and as such, she was outside of the restrictions of typical Athenian women. In someways, this may have aided her education and development. She became a hetaera, which is sometimes translated as prostitute, but that’s doesn’t do the position justice. Hetaera were women who entertained men intellectually, socially and sexually. They were capable of witty conversation and knowledgeable. To get an idea of who the hetaerea were, you’d have something like a prostitute mixed with a well-trained geisha. You can imagine that although Greek men had to marry an upper-class citizen for a wife, they more interested in actually spending time with women who were educated and could spend time with them and their friends, instead of being secreted away in the women’s quarters.   One Greek man, Pericles, certainly thought a hetaera could be more interesting than a whife. Pericles thought Aspasia was tops, and spent all of his time with her instead of with his wife. As a matter of fact, in a move that was shocking to the Athenians, Pericles wasn’t just content to have Aspasia as his mistress—he had to go and make her his wife. He divorced his proper, home-kept Greek wife and lived with this foreigner, whom he loved so audaciously that he kissed her at the doorstep every time he went in and out of the home. Now that’s just sweet. And that made many of the comic writers nervous.   It’s possible that Aspasia was so close to Pericles because she was his intellectual equal and some of the fragmented stories we have about her say that Pericles loved her for her brain. Really. Plutarch’s biography of Pericles relates ““Aspasia, some say, was courted and caressed by Pericles upon account of her knowledge and skill in politics.” (qtd 183)   Aspasia may have been one of Pericles’ logographers. If you recall, logographers were the speech writers of ancient Greece, and having a female logographer may be considered an insult to Pericles. For example, the lengthy argument made in Plato’s Menexenus (men-uh-zeen-us) that Aspasia wrote the famous funeral oration. There’s no reason why Aspasia couldn’t had written it, especially if she was as well-educated and cultural astute as the stories about her suggest. But Socrates makes the logographer woman analogous to the whore. Just as a logographer will write any one who pays a speech, regardless of their clients’ political or legal position, Aspasia the prostitute has, in scholar Madeleine Henry’s words “Aspasia made speakers of many men. The fact that one is names and that this one is a man with whom she had a sexual relationship, delicately suggests that she had sexual relationships with the others as well and that they all speak with words she taught them” (35). The connection between the rhetor and the prostitute does not go unnoticed in Cheryl Glenn’s 1994 article recovering Aspasia’s contribution to rhetoric. ““the ideal woman,” she writes “has been disciplined by cultural codes that require a closed mouth (silence) and closed body (chastity) and an enclosed life (domestic confinement).” (180). Glenn sees that Pericles saw—that Aspasia was very different from the Greek wife in all these ways, even breaking domestic confinement to write and teach.   The rhetoric teacher is a hussy because she teaches others. And it wasn’t just Pericles who went to Aspasia. From Plutarch, again “Socrates himself would sometimes go to visit her, and some of his acquaintances with him; and those who frequented her company would carry their wives with them to listen to her” because she “has the repute of being resorted to by many of the Athenians for instruction in the art of speaking” (qtd on 183). If this is accurate, Aspasia had her own school, the same way the Sophists like Isocrates did.     For all of the Socratic irony in the Menexenus that tears her down, you may have noticed that the Romans connected Aspasia with Socrates. Henry says that in some ways it wasn’t that Aspasia was a female Socrates, but, since she came first, Socrates was a male Aspasia. Aspasia also could out-socratic method Socrates and some people think that she taught Socrates how to be socratic. Listen to this dialoge quoted by Cicero in On Invention:     Aspasia reasoned thus with Xenophon's wife and Xenophon himself: "Please tell me madam, if your neighbor had a better gold ornament than you have, would you prefer that one or your own?" "That one." "Well, now, if she had a better husband than you have, would you prefer your husband or hers?" At this the woman blushed. "I wish you would tell me Xenophon, if your neighbor had a better horse than yours, would you prefer your horse or his?" "His." "Now, if he had a better wife than you have, would you prefer yours or his?" And at this Xenophon, too, was himself silent. . . . "Therefore, unless you can contrive that there be no better man or finer woman on earth you will certainly always be in dire want of what you consider best, namely, that you be the husband of the very best of wives, and that she be wedded to the very best of men." (I. xxxxi.51-53)   Sounds an awful lot like the socratic method, doesn’t it? Some scholars think, incidentally, that this dialog is sincerely advocating that both spouses in a marriage should be equally engaged in the relationship, but after reading the Menexenus, it seems to me that there is an equally compelling argument here that Aspasia is saying, “go ahead and covet your neighbor’s wife or husband because you could probably do better.” So you see how Aspasia’s rhetorical contributions are always being read through the lens of her sexuality.   According to the later Greek text Deipnosophists—or, as I like to call them, “Insufferable Foodies of the Second Sophistic”—it was Aspasia that also taught Socrates how to find, pursue and win love.   So if Aspasia was all this, why did she fade from the rhetorical tradition? The easiest answer is to say that as a foreigner and a woman it was very difficult for her to remain in the tradition. During the 1990s, feminist rhetoricians like Cheryl Glenn and C. Jan Swearingen, Susan Jarratt and Rory Ong all set out to “recover” Aspasia from the fragments and jealousy of the classical sources. Strangely, though, interest in Aspasia seems to have waned. There hasn’t been much written on her lately, maybe because it’s hard to say anything about her than what the unreliable, male classical sources have said. Madeleine Henry’s book, for instance, sets out to create not Aspasia’s history, but her historiography, how she has been invoked since the earliest western tradition through the renaissance, Enlightenment and up to the 20th century. In someways, then, we can’t ever know Aspasia, but only know about her. She remains stubbornly elusive and slandered.

Today we’re doing a podcast on Dionysius of Halicarnassus, not least because it’s so fun to say his name. Some people just have the kind of name that makes you want to say it all out, in full. Say it with me: Dionysius of Halicarnassus. It’s lovely. Fortunately, we’ll lget to say Dionysius of Halicarnassus several times today.   Dionysius of Halicarnassus, being of Halicarnassus, was Greek, but he wasn’t one of the 5th century golden age Greek rhetoricians--he lived around 50-6 BC during the Roman empire. Indeed, he studied in Rome and gave lessons there as part of the Greek educational diaspora. Dionysius of Halicarnassus could be seen as a great reconsiler between Roman and Greek thought, or he could be seen as a stoolie for the romans. He wrote of the Romans as the heirs of Greek culture and was always talking up the qualities of the Romans.   But he did love Greek rhetoricians. He writes admiringlyof Greek poets like Homer and Sappho of Greek rhetoricians Isocrates and Lysius, and even of Dinarchus, whom most people thought was kind of a lousy rhetor and even Dionysius of Halicarnassus admits was “neither the inventor of an individual style … nor the perfector of styles whcih others had invented” (1). He compiledhis thoughts on rhetoric into a more-or-less treatise known to us rather unimaginatively as the Art of Rhetoric. Not to be confused with all of the other Arts of Rhetoric, but the one by Dionyius of Halicarnasus. In the Art of Rhetoric and On Literary Composition, he offers in-depth analysis of many of the greatest Greek rhetors and rhetoricians, giving long examples in his text. As a matter of fact, much of the fragments we have from folks like Sappho comes from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, because he loved to quote big chunks of text and then go back and describe what was happening in those texts, even down to the level of the sounds of the vowels. that’s the level of analysis you get from dionysius of Halicarnassus.   And rather not surprisingly. Dionysius of Halicarnassus cited big chunks of text because he was a firm believer of imitation. Imitation,in this case, wasn’t the same as mimesis. Let me describe the differences: For Aristotle, Mimesis was about looking to nature and imitation from nature. So you see a bowl of grapes, and you get your teeny, tiniest paintbrush and you paint thos grapes so realistically that someone walking by might jam their finger reaching out to grab one. that’s mimesis. Dionysian imitation, though, is about imitating an author. Or authors. So now instead of staring at a bowl of grapes, you might stare at a poem about a bowl of grapes. Pedagogically, you might first emulate the poem, trying to recreate the poem as closely as you can, then adapt the poem, maybe now instead of a poem about grapes you make it a poem about plums. then you might rework and improve the poem, cutting back the long winded parts, or where the original author used a lame analogy or something. But then, in your own work, you continue this process with not just one poem, but dozens of poems, and not just by one author, but by dozens of authors. Through careful reading and analysis, you can identify the styles and methods most appropriate to your situation. This was popular for the Romans and it’s popular with us. If you’re going to write a love poem today, for instance, you might write a sonnet because of the successful love poems of Plutarch and Shakespeare, and you might find yourself using similar kinds of tropes and figures as Plutarch and Shakespeare, cataloging the beauty of your beloved, or comparing them to an animal or flower.this is all Dionysian imitation on your part. The Dionysian imitation caught on in a big way among Latin writers. Quintilian was a fan and included imitation of authors in his own pedagogy. Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ 3-volume treatise, known to us as--surprise--on imitation became a relative best seller. It makes sense considering the politics of greco-roman relations: if the Golden Age rhetors, Isocrates and Lysius, really are teh best, they can serve as models for Roman writers. these Roman writers, though, can exceed the Greek models. Just like how Dionusus of Halicarnassus thought that Romans were the literal descendents of later Greeks, he found a way that their writing could be descended from Greek style.   It may sound weird to us to not value originality, but Romans were sort of world-weary, “nothing new to be said” sorts who recognized the long literary precedent of Greek and Egyptian writers. Dionysian imitation could give them a way to feel that they were taking this long history and improving on it. And that meant a lot to them.   If you, like Dionysius of Hallicarnassus, have a fun name to say, or if you know of a rhetorician who, like Dionysius of Hallicarnassus, has a fun name to say, why not drop us a line at mererhetoricpodcast@gmail.com? Until next time, Dionysius of Hallicarnassus.

Shownotes (transcript available upon request) Complaint that Gorgias has not written a true encomium, but an apologia--a defense. He only defended her actions as not her fault instead of saying what she was actually excellent at. Isocrates complains that the encomium of helen is flaky, like the encomiums of bees or salt that other sophist have written. And, like so many of us, he uses this technicality to fuel his own attempt. It kind of reminds me of the Phaedrus, where Socrates wants to correct the speech he has just heard from another sophist. Something about seeing something done wrong makes you want to do it right.   And Isocrates is certain that is has been done wrong. First lines of his encomium demonstrate that: “There are some who think it a great thing if they put forward an odd, paradoxical theme and can discuss it without giving offense” Complaints against the sophist especially gorgias--Isocrates was one of those people who thought Gorgias was disreputable, moving around all the time, proving impossibles all the time, and, damningly, a political.  “The most ridiculous thing of all is that they seek to persuade us through their speeches that they have knowledge of politics” (9).  Writing about trivial things means that people will listen, admire--but not debate. By taking novel topics instead of political, they are easily the best--like being the best player of Calvinball. Instead, Isocrates praises in a political vein, using Helen as a figure for a contemporary controversy. But he does so in a roundabout way.   So to praise Helen, starts by praising her absconder. He mentions himself that “it would not yet be clear whether my speech is in praise of Helen or a prosecution of theseus” (21) But he argues by association: those who are “loved and admired her were themselves more admirable than the rest” (22). So, that argument goes, those who wanted Helen were the best sort, so she was, by assoication, pretty great. There’s a lot of praise of Theseus here for a supposed praise of Helen, but the Theseus Isocrates paints is a hero, not just of himself, like Hercules was, but for the Greek people in general he “freed the inhabitants of the city from great fear and distress” (25) and “thought it was better to die than to live and rule a site that was compelled to pay such a sorrowful tribute to its enemies” (27). Theseus was a selfless, poltical heo who has “cirtue and soundness of mind … especially in his managment of the city. He saw that those who seek to rule the citizens by force became slaves to others and those who put others’ lives in danger live in fear themselves” (32-33).   In deed, there’s so much civic love for Theseus here that you set the idea that Isocrates here isn’t just talking about fiction, or myth, or history , but politics. This is not just a fun triffle , a parodoxologia like where Gorgias made Helen a hero instead of a villian. this is not paignion, a fun peice of exhition. George Kenedy argues that Isocrates goes on at such great length about theseus because “theseus is worthy of Helen” and similarly “Athens is worth of the hegemony which it should take from Sparta” (81). In other words, The Helen is “in fact a clear statement of Isorates’ program of Panhellenism” (80)--a united federation of greek city states helmed by Athens.   The praise of Helen herself backs up this idea: “It is due to Helen that we are not the slaves of the barbarian” paraphrases Kennedy (82). Isocrates talks about Helen the way that 19th century americans talked about manifest destiny: “A longing for beautiful things,... is innate in us, and it has a strength greater than our other wishes” and “we enslave ourselves to such people with more pleasure than we rule others” (55-57). Helen wasn’t just beautiful--she was devine. She “acheive more than other mortals just as she excelled over them in appearances. Not only did she win immortality, but she also gained power equal to the gods’” (61). While Theseus was honored by association to be chosen to judge the gods, Helen was defied, and --and this is important for the political analogy--she was able to assist in the apotheiosis of Menelaisis and others.   In the end, Isocrates’ Helen is several things at once: it is a criticism of the Gorgias and the other traveling sophists, who made their living by proving the impossible in demonstration speeches that delighted and caused, to paraphrase Gorgias’ own words, amusement for the authors. He’s presenting a political tract, similar to the one in the PanAthenaicus, where he argues for a more involved Athenian hegemony in panhellenic unity. He’s also presenting a pedagogical advertisment: study with me, he says, and you’ll create real political speeches, not fluffy bits of taffy. At the end of the speech, ever the teacher, Isocrates says “If, then, some people wish to elaborate this material and expand on it, they will not lack material to stimulate their praise of Helen beyond what I have said, but they will find many original arguments to make about her”--yes, he’s setting up his potential students to use his encomium--a real encomium--as a model for their own, future, semi-scaffolded work.

Transcript available on request   Return from hiatus. Dissertation submitted to readers.       Gorgias. Not The Gorgias, but gorias himself.               There are very few rhetoricians who get a shiny golden statue made of them. In fact, I don’t personally know anyone who has one. But when I think of solid golden statues, I think of one man in specific—Gorgias. People built a golden statue to Gorgias. Sold. Gold. Awarded many honors that were usually reserved for citizens. Traveled around like a rock star.       And what do you do when you’re a rock star? What did the Beatles do? Find greater challenges.       Helen of Troy’s position in society       Encomium       Why did he it—it’s fun (also money) “I wishes to write a speech which would be a praise of Helen and diversion to myself”—but also demonstrate the power of language, arguing implicitly that his speech has been effective. While he’s describing that Helen couldn’t help herself, everyone in the audience is being swept away, too. paignia, a playful piece. Shining example of “paradoxologia.”           it’s a bit contradictory to have an orator tell you to beware of the things people say in beautiful ways because they could lead you astray. He certainly isn’t making a case for straight-talking, the way he’s speaking, but the idea that speech can be good and bad and can be immensely powerful makes Gorgias himself into a supposed kind of benevolent dictator of people’s opinions and emotions.   How he does it: Gorgiac figures divices like antithesis and paronomasia.           “opinion is slippery and insecure it casts those empllying it into slippery and insecure successes” “Speech is a powerful lord” “is she was persuaded by speech she did not do wrong but was unfortunate.       Say H had been physically abducted—certaitnly she wouldn’t be at fault. G says that Helen being seduced by words was just as powerful. Since speech can “stop fear and banish grief and create joy and nurture pity” Speech is “comparable to the power of drugs over the nature of bodies”           The dual nature of speech is strongly marked by Gorgias’ use of antithesis. He discusses “a passion which loved to conquer and a love of honor which was unconquered” to describe Helen (45). He is not only defending Helen, but using Helen’s dual nature to prepare his listeners for his explanation of the positive and negative potential of rhetoric. “       isocolon; he describes cities and manpower, body and beautiful, soul and wisdom, action and virtue, and speech and truth (44). By drawing connections between these things, Gorgias sets the stage for his thesis about the necessity for speaker to speak truth or else immorally lead people astray against their ability to stop the speaker. Speaking of setting the stage, while Gorgias uses isocolon quite liberally, he only uses two significant metaphors, both dealing with the nature of speech. He describes speech as both a lord and a drug, two metaphors which describe the irresistible nature of speech as well as speech’s power to be both benevolent and maleficent (45-46).   Summary           Why did they love him so much? Well, he was an innovator, for one: he is one of the first generation of sophists, the father of sophistry, if you will.       Not everyone loves him, though. : Aristotle also criticizes Gorgias’ showmanship and money grubbing. Isocrates wrote a later encomium of Helen and he accuses Gorgias of not having really written an encomium—no praise of her, but defense (Kennedy 21).Father of sophistry becomes Socrates’ foil in Gorgias, and it’s not surprising given the cheerfully deceiving and deceived of the Encomium’s radical departure from Greek traditional view of Helen.       Next week: Isocrates’ Encomium of Helen  

Right-Click the "pod" icon (top left) to download this episode (click to listen, or right-click to "save as" an mp3 file on your computer). Notes, References, and Links for further study: Tragedy and Hope dot com Invitation to the Tragedy and Hope online community (link expires monthly) Log in page for the Tragedy and Hope online community Peace Revolution primary site (2009-2012)* Peace Revolution backup stream (2006-2012)* Includes the 9/11 Synchronicity Podcast (predecessor to Peace Revolution) *These 2 podcasts and lectures amount to 400+ hours of commercial-free educational content, which formulate a comprehensive and conscious curriculum. 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Kennedy did not agree Oswald lone assassin (ABC News) (9m-13m) U.S. Government Found Guilty of Murdering Martin Luther King by Lee Camp (13m-19m) U.S. Court: Martin Luther King Killed by the Authorities by Barrie Zwicker (19m-28m) Richard's introductory monologue (28m-2h50m) Debate: Larken Rose (Anarchy) vs. Tom Willcutts (Authority) History… So It Doesn't Repeat (2h50-5h25m) Briefing: Kevin Cole (Classical Trivium vs. Trivium Method) History… So It Doesn't Repeat (5h25m-6h50m) “Behaviorism in Disguise” School Sucks Podcast #150 Hist ory... So It Doesn't Repeat (Official YouTube Series Playlist) Timecodes, notes, links, and references are posted just below the HD video: Notes, Links, & References for "The Trivium Method vs. The Classical Trivium" (recorded February 17, 2013) 1m “The Great Chain of Being and the Organic Unity of the Polis” by Kevin Cole (Winter 2013) 2m “The Trivium Method” by Jan Irvin and Gene Odening @ Gnostic Media dot com 3m “The Trivium Method of Critical Thinking and Creative Problem Solving” vs. the innate method of learning, and comparing it to how the Classical Trivium (as a method of institutionalizing individuals) has historically been used prior to the 21st century. 4m History of the Classical Trivium is the history of the Great Chain of Being, useful in shaping cultures. The Great Chain of Being is defined in classical terms. 5m The concept of “balanced” government and civil society itself, The Ominous Continuity of the “education” system we know as schooling 6m The changing of terms as a means of gaining power over unwitting minds 7m The Occulting of Knowledge to create Power 8m Legacy of 2,500 years of the Noble Lie being used to create Power 9m Romantic Nationalism & Germany vs. Limited Government System, continued definition of the Great Chain of Being (3 estates) 10m Caste System, Divine Right of Kings, and the Classical Trivium; specifically the artificial scarcity of the “7” liberal arts 11m Enkyklios Paideia and the Caste System, Arnold Toynbee “it allows each empire to be immortal” 12m Great Chain of Being and the Classical Trivium in context of Organic Unity 13m United Nations Charter provisions, Positive and Negative Rights, staying knowledgeable about the first principles and jury nullification, Thomas Jefferson and First Principles Article 29: 1. Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. 2. In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society. Article 30: Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein. 14m Logical foundation of Negative Rights, Irrational foundation of Positive Rights 15m Definition of Organic Unity 16m Scott Buchannan quote on the Classical Trivium to create Organic Unity, Cardinal and Ordinal structures of the story (Buchannan was a Rhodes Scholar) 17m Definitions: The Auctors, The Polis, The Polity, Episcopal, hierarchical structures of authorities, Anglicanism (Church of England) 18m Comparison and Contrast the Trivium Method vs. the Classical Trivium, 7 Liberal Arts, Plato, Aristotle, educational philosophy and Isocrates, 19m The “general education” of the inscribed circle of the Enkyklios Paideia, foreshadowing Fichte and Hegel of the Prussian Education System encyclopedia (n.) 1530s, "course of instruction," from Modern Latin encyclopaedia (c.1500), literally "training in a circle," i.e. the "circle" of arts and sciences, the essentials of a liberal education; from enkyklios "circular," and paideia “education”. According to some accounts such as the American Heritage Dictionary copyists of Latin manuscripts took this phrase to be a single Greek word, enkuklopaedia. 20m plunder v. production and human livestock, classical Trivium as a system of creating production to be plundered… farming plunder 21m Latin education and the Divine Right of Kings, organic unity and feudalism, legitimizing the great chain of being (methods of authority), using the battlefield and education to subjugate individuals for lack of Knowledge. 22m Legitimizing the storyteller as the authority of the day, group-think, authority to control human resources. Any citizen can become an individual through learning habits of self-reliance 23m “Authorities” (educators, sophists) define the “Grammar” of the Classical Trivium, thus making the “Logic” a belief, not an understanding. No knowledge is necessary for belief, in fact belief is often what fills the void created when Knowledge is absent. 24m Unified systems of knowledge, cybernetics and the ship of state (Plato), first principles and common ground (Logic) necessary for linguistic communication. The use of these ideologies to create state systems. 25m Richard Haklyut and Queen Elizabeth, propagating organic unity as “natural”, even though it depends on people ruling over others. Scott Buchannan papers from Harvard University, “Poetry and Mathematics” (foreshadowing role of Rhodes Scholars) Richard Hakluyt (c. 1552 or 1553 – 23 November 1616) was an English writer. He is known for promoting the settlement of North America by the English through his works, notably Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America (1582) and The Principal Navigations, Voiages, Traffiques and Discoueries of the English Nation (1589–1600). 26m Dorothy Sayers and removing the myths to get to the facts of her claims, Reinhold Niebuhr, Royal Institute of International Affairs, Milner Rhodes Roundtable Group, secularizing values to continue organic unity 27m Dorothy Sayers quotes in favor of British Empire building and Cecil Rhodes / Milner Roundtable Group and Organic Unity 28m Origins of the systems which create and facilitate organic unity, cybernetics, using the knowledge of self-learning to dissect the history and identify the contradictions of our public educations 29m Gnostic Media interview with Gene Odening, how the human being learns, removing the dogma from the process of learning for one's self 30m Asking substantial questions and using a method to find valid answers consistently vs. the Classical Trivium (prescribed “Grammar”, mandated “Logic”, rhetoric which reinforces servitude) 31m Isocrates and literacy as a form of slavery (i.e. sophism) until the reader learns how to identify reality and remove unreality (i.e. logic). 32m closed systems of learning to maintain the city-states, aristocracy, and ruling class to manage the polity (public); educating the kings, adopting education systems to gain power over the polity, dichotomy of control, creating knowledge gaps to create “power”. 33m focus on significant and substantial, discard the arbitrary, dismiss the irrational. Sayers' biases and the basis of Christian Homeschooling in America. 34m Sayers' system as the “closest to the perfection of Plato's Republic” – Freemasonry 35m Christian Homeschooling and predefined grammar, infecting the logic by not asking preliminary questions to identify that which exists, reality from unreality (Sayers' seeds of irrationality) 36m History of Ideas in relation to the Trivium Method contrasted to the Classical Trivium and the history of creating organic unity 37m The Classical Trivium, Freemasonry as a feedback mechanism for creating organic unity through empire, “Builders of Empire: Freemasons and British Imperialism (1717-1927)” by Jessica Harland Jacobs 38m “Origins of Freemasonry” by Thomas Paine, 39m Johann Joachim Christoph “J.C.” Bode, Nicholas Bonneville, Philo's Reply to Questions Concerning His Association with the Illuminati by Jeva Singh-Anand, Illuminati Manifesto of World Revolution (1792) translated by Marco de Luchetti, 40m King Elfwad, Charlemagne, and the origins of the word “Trivium” by Alcuin of York 41m Ancient Greece, systems of preserving itself against surrounding piranha states 42m Enkyklios Paideia created by Isocrates preserves organic unity until Thomas Jefferson recognizes what it is, and what it does 43m Scott Buchanan and Stringfellow Barr (Rhodes Scholars) and Freemasonry, origins of “Classical Trivium” revival veiling the Enkyklios Paideia 44m filling in between Isocrates and the Freemasons, Jesuits and the Ratio Studiorum, which was rejected by John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, Ratio Studiorum as continuation of organic unity under godhead of theology. 45m Thomas Jefferson (post-revolution) goes to William and Mary and has the Classical Trivium removed from the curriculum, breaking the mechanism of British perpetuation of their organic unity 46m Thomas Jefferson addressing the Educational Perennialists of his day, accepting the theory before inspection, condemnation prior to observation, “putting your logic before your grammar” as Jan Irvin says 47m Education as a tool of creating culture, its how the state reproduces itself, “reality” filtered through he prescribed rhetoric of the state, 48m Ignatius Loyola, Alumbrados, the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius Loyola as the origins of the esoteric organic unity progressed by the Jesuits, various flavors of organic unity (various empires through time), sacrifice of the individual to the state 49m Bavarian Illuminati, Thomas Paine, Nicholas Bonneville, and connections to the origins of America, May 1, 1776, Adam Weishaupt (1911 Encyclopedia Britannica entry for Illumati), Baron Adolph ‘Philo' Knigge as Weishaupt's #2 in the Bavarian Illuminati 50m Bavarian Illuminati as intellectual group fighting against organic unity and divine right of kings in Europe. “Philo's Reply to Questions Concerning His Association with the Illuminati” Reply by Jeva Singh Anand reveals the personal conversations between Adam Weishaupt and Baron von Knigge prior to Knigge's resignation from the Bavarian Illuminati and the promotion of revolutionary publisher J.C. Bode. 51m Thomas Paine's references to Samuel Prichard's “Freemasonry is based on the foundation of the Liberal Arts” quote, Illuminati as a system trying to do away with the state, Isidore of Seville and the creation of civil polity by limited education 52m Bavarian Illuminati vs. Religion and the State, Freemasonry as the genitalia of the state and the injection of organic unity throughout indigenous populations, Illuminati plans to use for the state to reproduce itself via taking over Freemasonry. 53m the Strict Observance Lodge of Freemasonry in Bavaria, Degree Systems above traditional York Rite degrees, transcending nationhood. Reinhard Koselleck's “Critique and Crises : Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society” (published by M.I.T.) on Freemasonry and creating organic unity 54m Original members of the Illuminati influencing American education, The Ultimate History Lesson with John Taylor Gatto 55m Juxtaposing internet lore vs. actual artifacts and evidence of the Bavarian Illuminati, similar to Jesuits in seeing value of controlling education, 1610 Wood Manuscript (The Hiram Key by Lomas and Knight) 56m Individual Liberty based on that which exists vs. irrational illusions of Authority, Bonneville, Jefferson, and the unknown history of Bavarian Illuminati influence in America's origins. 57m Social Circle Freemasonic Lodge, papers published by J.C. Bode of the Bavarian Illuminati, promoted after Knigge's resignation, connections to Prussian education. 58m Johann Fichte's references to Johann Pestalozzi's organic unity method of schooling and creation of the Prussian education system, giving birth to Romantic Nationalism as opposed to the Jeffersonian ideas of nationhood. 59m Milton Peterson's works on Thomas Jefferson, rejection of classical forms of the Trivium as being connected to the Great Chain of Being, i.e. a caste society subjugating individuals to illusory authority 1h1m ideas of creating a balanced government based on first principles subject to existence, not dogma; derivative proofs of non-aggression undermined by changes in education system which Jefferson feared, J.J. Rousseau, John Locke, The Meaning of Meaning, particularity and universiality, from Charlemagne through to the 21st Century. 1h5m Jefferson displacing the Classical Trivium at the University of Virginia, Jefferson laments genocide of indigenous languages and loss of etymology. 1h6m encryption of language enables selective power transfer 1h8m how to preserve the first principles which inspired the Constitution 1h10m Ben Franklin's education in the liberal arts and secret societies 1h11m parallels of Isocrates and Freemasonic organic unity, “Builders of Empire” as blueprint for how Freemasonry assumes authority throughout the world 1h14m philosophic corruptions of reality, claims of authority break down under scrutiny and defined terms, taboo to discuss because you might perceive the ruse of organic unity 1h15m Thomas Jefferson displaces classical Trivium as being tied to the Great Chain of Being 1h16m Legacy of Alcuin of York, creating a duality in Christianity, “othering” of the natural world, Basil Bernstein's work on the classical Trivium, Noah Webster, John Adams, Thomas Paine, Emerson and Thoreau, Rousseau's social contract, liberal arts as chains of garland flung over reality, Bavarian Illuminati 1h17m Epistemological cartoons instead of getting into the details and artifacts, Techne (Technology) as a Craft to propel Culture (see: Freemasonry), Thomas Paine quote on education and knowledge of language vs. knowledge of things, Syntax and Statecraft in history 1h18m Destutt De Tracy “Elements of Ideology”, science of ideas from Condillac's Statue of Man, solidifying a science of ideas to map out human resource control 1h19m Destutt De Tracy: how to define and identify in order to think clearly and progress to understanding 1h20m Prussian Nationalism, Hegel and the obsolescence of the Divine Right of Kings and “Authority” in general, discovering that life is not how we were taught it is as a result of the Prussian education system changing America away from natural rights liberalism 1h21m systems of natural rights and state education are not compatible 1h22m unitary education by congress is in direct contradiction to the founding principles of America, collectivism, pre-amble missing from Constitution, ambiguity therefore included unnecessarily 1h24m Classical Trivium imparting language without defense against unreality, thus creates a system of control 1h25m without defense against unreality, society becomes skewed and actions in conflict with needs of survival, as a result of Enkyklios Paideia introduced into England by the Venetian Black Noblity 1h26m Webster Tarpley's 1981 article on the Venetian Black Nobility, how to fill in the blanks when history has been purposely omitted, creating cognitive dissonance 1h28m Wilhelm Wundt and the “Clockwork Orange” mentality of treating people as mechanical toys, to be manipulated; and how asking questions is the key to circumventing Wundtian control systems 1h30m Frederick the Great and the Gymnasium of Prussian Education, Obama's recent references to the value of Prussian industrial training 1h31m John Taylor Gatto's “Underground History of American Education” referring to Prussian indoctrination methods being used in America, Prussian principles displace American first princples imparted in Constitution 1h32m Prussian education creates a strong nationalistic fervor, at behest of “national” interest, parallels between Nazi Germany and America today via the Prussian education system 1h33m Frederick the Great, Freemasonry, Education, and Illuminati connections; going after our youngest through compulsory schooling, creation of schooling in America by secret societies 1h34m Frederick the Great May 1, 1786 creating constitutions of Freemasonry, similar degrees to draw people into the Illuminati plan by imitating Freemasonry 1h35m Reworking masonic texts to re-present the ideas to foment revolution, Amis Reunis, Lodge of the Nine Sisters, and the Social Circle, French Revolution, Congress of Wilhelmsbad, Baron Knigge and the attempts to recruit powerful figures into their stable of talent. Hegel, Herter, Mozart, Goethe, Zeitgiest (spirit of the age) 1h36m origin myth of the Nine Muses / Nine Sisters lodge of Freemasonry in France 1h37m Rev. George Washington Snyder letter to George Washington, Oct 24, 1798 regarding the Bavarian Illuminati, spores dispersed into America, Anti-Freemasonic Party to drive Freemasons from power 1h38m Cecil Rhodes and fellow Freemasons creating British organic unity via a Secret Society based on the methods of the Jesuits (Ratio Studiorum) 1h39m Ben Franklin and the Lodge of the Nine Sisters, representing the Nine Muses (9 liberal arts) as set down by Martianus Capella, Destutt De Tracy, Voltaire members of the lodge, Jefferson's rejection of their first principles, Positive vs. Negative origins of Government 1h40m Napoleon rejected the first principles as Jefferson did, Destutt De Tracy deposed from his educational system, Grammar, Logic, & Ideology (instead of rhetoric) 1h41m Jefferson's own contradictions (not perfect) but noted the success of America dependent on independence from British linguistic controls 1h42m Cecil Rhodes and the Jesuits, organic unitycommon to plans of monopoly, power, and empire, tracing back to the Indian (of India) monitorial schools (pedagogical control of group by authority at the front of the room), another brick in the wall as the craft of masonry Cecil John Rhodes PC, DCL (5 July 1853 – 26 March 1902) was an English-born South African businessman, mining magnate, and politician. He was the founder of the diamond company De Beers, and an ardent believer in British colonialism, he was the founder of the state of Rhodesia, which was named after him. He set up the provisions of the Rhodes Scholarship, which is funded by his estate. Rhodes and his legacy are memorialized in the 1966 textbook “Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time” by Dr. Carroll Quigley, professor at Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. 1h43m Cecil Rhodes goal to change American Constitution to bring America back under control of Britain by rings-within-rings, using Rhodes Scholars to create organic unity. 1h43m Cecil Rhodes plans grow roots in America, proliferating Anglo-Saxon Nationalism (everyone else was a “barbarian”) 1h44m Equal rights only for “civilized” men (positive rights) vs. natural rights inherent to all human beings 1h45m Cecil Rhodes Last Will and Testament, seeking to decontextualize the history and create amnesia in the American polity 1h46m Cecil Rhodes' band of merry men, bring in Prussian ideals via Rhodes Scholars, creating a spacial-temporal consciousness shift 1h47m Carroll Quigley's books addressing Rhodes and organic unity (Evolution of Civilizations, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, The Anglo-American Establishment), Porter Sargent's books on the same topic 1h48m Clarence Streit's “Union Now” plan to merge America with Britain, Andrew Carnegie's “Triumph of Democracy”, Linus Pauling's “Union Now” speech, Harris Wolford of the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society), Rhodes Roundtable group seeking to create a union of democracies, origins of Globalism, collaboration between Rhodes Roundtable, Rockefeller, Carnegie trusts. 1h49m undoing Thomas Paine's “Common Sense”, to reverse roles and undo common sense to say America is subservient to Britain 1h50m Clarence Streit, Stringfellow Barr, and Scott Buchanan, (all Rhodes scholars) reviving the Classical Trivium, indoctrinating Anglo-American values and organic unity 1h51m Rhodes Roundtable supports “Union Now”, via Pilgrims Society, also seeking Organic Unity with Britain, origins of Apartheid in South Africa, Jan Smuts and Wholism as the philosophy of the British Empire (plunder rebranded as freedom) 1h52m “Union Now” as a Fabian Society for Federalists to create organic unity, Embers of World Conversation (Buchannan), origins of The Great Books of the Western World with Richard McKeown 1h53 Marshall McLuhan and I.A. Richards work on the Classical Trivium, James Bryant Conant 1h54m Poetry and Mathematics by Scott Buchanan (Rhodes Scholar) rediscovers the Classical Trivium, John Erskine, Nicholas Murray Butler, St. Thomas Aquinas, Great Chain of Being, and Mortimer Adler and logic existing within systems, Dr. Randall Hart “Classical Trivium” book 1h55m John Erskine bringing selective reading into the U.S., Woodbury and the X Club (see: Huxley), Matthew Arnold and Cecil Rhodes 1h56m Alfred Zimmern, William Benton, Benton and Bowles Advertising trending organic unity 1h57m “Union Now” and the liberal education at St. John's University and the University of Chicago, Leo Strauss, Neocons, Robert Maynard Hutchins, and the origins of the Great Books of the Western World 1h58m Legacy of Cecil Rhodes, Pilgrims Society, RIIA, CFR, and creating organic unity in America 1h59m Arthur Balfour, Cecil Rhodes, Baron Rothschild and Palestine; Pilgrims Society as Anglo-American Alliance to usurp national government of the U.S. vis a vis Organic Union 2h re-branding British Empire as part of organic unity and role of St. John's university in revival of the Classical Trivium within the Anglo-American tradition. 2h2m “Fat Man's Class” and William Benton, J. Walter Thompson Company, Denise Sutton's “Globalising Ideal Beauty: How Female Copywriters of the J. Walter Thompson Advertising Agency Redefined Beauty for the Twentieth Century”, De Beers Diamond Cartel, behaviorism (via John Watson) included to manipulate populations 2h3m Encyclopedia Britannica bought by William Benton vs. The Great Books of the Western World, Benton worked with R. Gordon Wasson, Bank of International Settlements 2h5m Benton and “Fat Man's Class” sought to proliferate sophism into the business community, Henry Luce's support, “The Romance of Commerce and Culture”, Walter Paepke, importation of Prussian/German culture into business and politics, boxing up our culture to bring concensus by de-individualizing and holding conflicting thoughts is the norm. 2h7m Great Books of the Western World and Eugenics, signers of the GBWW project (several Union Now supporters & Rhodes Scholars among other collectivist groups seeking organic unity for Anglo-Saxon Establishment power structures) 2h9m Society for the Cincinnatus and the ominous continuity of these ideas, Mirabeau as a member of the Social Circle, hereditary orders to create organic unity, Walter Paepke as founder of the Aspen Institute which funded the GBWW, founded on commemoration date of Goethe, ex-Bavarian Illuminati; origin of Aspen's popularity and the Noble Lie 2h10m Leo Strauss at St. John's University as a Scott Buchanan Scholar 2h11m GBWW to impart culture to common man, a scarcity not circulated in 70 years, a legacy of organic unity being propagated via Classical Trivium 2h12m Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (Rhodes Scholar, Harvard), Power and Interdependence 2h13m London School of Economics (Fabian Socialist institution), Rothschild family funding LSE 2h14m “The Real New World Order” (Foreign Affairs Publication) by Anne-Marie Slaughter, Office for Policy Planning, CFR driving organic unity 2h15m “The Real New World Order” is published by the Council on Foreign Relations 2h16m David Rockefeller, Memoirs, p. 505 quote, Admiral Chester Ward on CFR quote from Barry Goldwater biography “With No Apologies” chapter 33 “Our Non-Elected Rulers” 2h17m H.G. Wells, Fabian Socialist, Open Conspiracy, Island of Dr. Moreau, organic unity through Eugenics (see: G. Stanley Hall quote on organic unity in “NEA: Trojan Horse”), erasing of national borders, ethically responsible to control the many, “The Shape of Things to Come” by H.G. Wells H.G. Wells' most consistent political ideal was the World State. He stated in his autobiography that from 1900 onward he considered a World State inevitable. He envisioned the state to be a planned society that would advance science, end nationalism, and allow people to progress by merit rather than birth. In 1932, he told Young Liberals at the University of Oxford that progressive leaders must become liberal fascists or enlightened Nazis in order to implement their ideas.[35]In 1940, Wells published a book called The New World Order that outlined his plan as to how a World Government will be set up. 2h18m Technocracy to control the thoughts of the polity, C.K. Ogden and I.A. Richards “The Meaning of Meaning”, imparting of Liberal Arts to create civil polity, language as technology to control polity 2h20m Inherent rights (negative rights) vs. Positive Rights (arcane laws of governance and authority), “Fire in the Minds of Men” by James H. Billington (Rhodes Scholar & Librarian of Congress), the need to preserve oral traditions and the attack of our culture to manipulate our perceptions, thus to create organic unity, the use of cybernetics to wage psychological warfare, using the mind as the harness of human resources, Stephen Biko “the most powerful weapon in the hands of the oppressor are the minds of the oppressed.” 2h22m Ludwig Wittgenstein, I.A. Richards, and manipulating language to control perceptions in cybernetics, Macy Conferences of cybernetic applications, and “New Criticism” to decontextualize historical documents, thus re-defining liberty by separating literature from history. Rhodes/Milner Roundtable participation in supporting “New Criticism” and decontextualizing history to create organic unity; which evolved from the Prussian Nationalism which preceded it. 2h25m Frank Aydelotte (Rhodes Scholar) on Classical Trivium and Organic Unity, “spelling” to use words to further “liberty” in British terms. 2h26m Lord Percy v. Thomas Jefferson, 2h27m Arnold Toynbee and analogical reasoning using the Classical Trivium to promote British organic unity 2h28m Eugenics, Rockefeller, and organic unity vis a vis “The Molecular Biology of Life: Caltech, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Rise of the New Biology ” by Lily Kay (M.I.T.) 2h29m Frank and James Angell, G. Stanley Hall, and others instrumental introducing the Prussian education system into America, John Taylor Gatto's work, Max Weber and scientific dictatorship 2h30m Population Control, Eugenics, and the Rockefeller “Science of Man” project rebranded as “molecular biology”, Linus Pauling's support of Lily Kay's book, Mr. and Mrs. Pauling support “Union Now” and other Anglo-American plans of unification, Delphi Technique of mind control, managing consent, Walter Lippmann 2h32m Rockefeller “Science of Man”, Edward Alsworth Ross' “Social Control”, mapping the individual to destroy individuality, Lily Kay unmasks the eugenic agenda of the elites, culling the polity to create organic unity. Artificial scarcity of technology, planned economies (Agenda 21) 2h33m SUMMARY: By changing the terms and definitions throughout history, the theme of controlling the polity by means of irrational means has thus far been successful. Our voluntary servitude to ideas which are unreality, continues to be the problem; learning and asking substantial questions and finding valid answers continues to be the solution. 2h34m Kevin Cole's closing statement, the logic behind the liberal arts education, slavery vs. free minds, the perpetuation of organic unity throughout time to create slave vs. free dichotomy. In America rights were inherent, not because you're become a subservient slave to the state. WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE? CHECK OUT "THE ULTIMATE HISTORY LESSON: A WEEKEND WITH JOHN TAYLOR GATTO"! 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  Click here to download this episode, or use the download link at the bottom of the notes for this episode.Notes, References, and Links for further study:Tragedy and Hope dot comInvitation to the Tragedy and Hope online community (link expires monthly)Log in page for the Tragedy and Hope online communityPeace Revolution primary site (2009-2012)*Peace Revolution backup stream (2006-2012)*Includes the 9/11 Synchronicity Podcast (predecessor to Peace Revolution)*These 2 podcasts and lectures amount to 400+ hours of commercial-free educational content, which formulate a comprehensive and conscious curriculum.The Ultimate History Lesson dot com (the film, notes, references, transcript, etc.)IMDB Page for The Ultimate History LessonFacebook Page for The Ultimate History LessonTwitter feed for Tragedy and HopeThe Ultimate History Lesson Official Playlist (on YouTube)UHL Research Bonus Pack and Gatto Fundraiser Pack(fundraiser for media partners and JTG)Partner Coupon Codes (MUST BE IN ALL CAPS):GNOSTICMEDIACORBETTREPORTMEDIAMONARCHYREDICERADIOSCHOOLSUCKSMERIAHELLERFREEDOMSPHOENIXReference Map to Episode 070:(1m-4m) Despotism vs. Aaron Dykes (Infowars Nightly News clip) by R.G.(4m-6m) U.S. Army Kills Kids by Abby Martin (RT)(6m-9m) Robert F. Kennedy did not agree Oswald lone assassin (ABC News)(9m-13m) U.S. Government Found Guilty of Murdering Martin Luther King by Lee Camp(13m-19m) U.S. Court: Martin Luther King Killed by the Authorities by Barrie Zwicker(19m-28m) Richard's introductory monologue(28m-2h50m) Debate: Larken Rose (Anarchy) vs. Tom Willcutts (Authority) History… So It Doesn't Repeat(2h50-5h25m) Briefing: Kevin Cole (Classical Trivium vs. Trivium Method) History… So It Doesn't Repeat(5h25m-6h50m) “Behaviorism in Disguise” School Sucks Podcast #150Hist ory... So It Doesn't Repeat (Official YouTube Series Playlist) Timecodes, notes, links, and references are posted just below the HD video: Notes, Links, & References for "The Trivium Method vs. The Classical Trivium" (recorded February 17, 2013) 1m “The Great Chain of Being and the Organic Unity of the Polis” by Kevin Cole (Winter 2013) 2m “The Trivium Method” by Jan Irvin and Gene Odening @ Gnostic Media dot com 3m “The Trivium Method of Critical Thinking and Creative Problem Solving” vs. the innate method of learning, and comparing it to how the Classical Trivium (as a method of institutionalizing individuals) has historically been used prior to the 21st century. 4m History of the Classical Trivium is the history of the Great Chain of Being, useful in shaping cultures. The Great Chain of Being is defined in classical terms. 5m The concept of “balanced” government and civil society itself, The Ominous Continuity of the “education” system we know as schooling 6m The changing of terms as a means of gaining power over unwitting minds 7m The Occulting of Knowledge to create Power 8m Legacy of 2,500 years of the Noble Lie being used to create Power 9m Romantic Nationalism & Germany vs. Limited Government System, continued definition of the Great Chain of Being (3 estates) 10m Caste System, Divine Right of Kings, and the Classical Trivium; specifically the artificial scarcity of the “7” liberal arts 11m Enkyklios Paideia and the Caste System, Arnold Toynbee “it allows each empire to be immortal” 12m Great Chain of Being and the Classical Trivium in context of Organic Unity 13m United Nations Charter provisions, Positive and Negative Rights, staying knowledgeable about the first principles and jury nullification, Thomas Jefferson and First Principles Article 29: 1. Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. 2. In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society. Article 30: Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein. 14m Logical foundation of Negative Rights, Irrational foundation of Positive Rights 15m Definition of Organic Unity 16m Scott Buchannan quote on the Classical Trivium to create Organic Unity, Cardinal and Ordinal structures of the story (Buchannan was a Rhodes Scholar) 17m Definitions: The Auctors, The Polis, The Polity, Episcopal, hierarchical structures of authorities, Anglicanism (Church of England) 18m Comparison and Contrast the Trivium Method vs. the Classical Trivium, 7 Liberal Arts, Plato, Aristotle, educational philosophy and Isocrates, 19m The “general education” of the inscribed circle of the Enkyklios Paideia, foreshadowing Fichte and Hegel of the Prussian Education System encyclopedia (n.) 1530s, "course of instruction," from Modern Latin encyclopaedia (c.1500), literally "training in a circle," i.e. the "circle" of arts and sciences, the essentials of a liberal education; from enkyklios "circular," and paideia “education”. According to some accounts such as the American Heritage Dictionary copyists of Latin manuscripts took this phrase to be a single Greek word, enkuklopaedia. 20m plunder v. production and human livestock, classical Trivium as a system of creating production to be plundered… farming plunder 21m Latin education and the Divine Right of Kings, organic unity and feudalism, legitimizing the great chain of being (methods of authority), using the battlefield and education to subjugate individuals for lack of Knowledge. 22m Legitimizing the storyteller as the authority of the day, group-think, authority to control human resources. Any citizen can become an individual through learning habits of self-reliance 23m “Authorities” (educators, sophists) define the “Grammar” of the Classical Trivium, thus making the “Logic” a belief, not an understanding. No knowledge is necessary for belief, in fact belief is often what fills the void created when Knowledge is absent. 24m Unified systems of knowledge, cybernetics and the ship of state (Plato), first principles and common ground (Logic) necessary for linguistic communication. The use of these ideologies to create state systems. 25m Richard Haklyut and Queen Elizabeth, propagating organic unity as “natural”, even though it depends on people ruling over others. Scott Buchannan papers from Harvard University, “Poetry and Mathematics” (foreshadowing role of Rhodes Scholars) Richard Hakluyt (c. 1552 or 1553 – 23 November 1616) was an English writer. He is known for promoting the settlement of North America by the English through his works, notably Divers Voyages Touching the Discoverie of America (1582) and The Principal Navigations, Voiages, Traffiques and Discoueries of the English Nation (1589–1600). 26m Dorothy Sayers and removing the myths to get to the facts of her claims, Reinhold Niebuhr, Royal Institute of International Affairs, Milner Rhodes Roundtable Group, secularizing values to continue organic unity 27m Dorothy Sayers quotes in favor of British Empire building and Cecil Rhodes / Milner Roundtable Group and Organic Unity 28m Origins of the systems which create and facilitate organic unity, cybernetics, using the knowledge of self-learning to dissect the history and identify the contradictions of our public educations 29m Gnostic Media interview with Gene Odening, how the human being learns, removing the dogma from the process of learning for one's self 30m Asking substantial questions and using a method to find valid answers consistently vs. the Classical Trivium (prescribed “Grammar”, mandated “Logic”, rhetoric which reinforces servitude) 31m Isocrates and literacy as a form of slavery (i.e. sophism) until the reader learns how to identify reality and remove unreality (i.e. logic). 32m closed systems of learning to maintain the city-states, aristocracy, and ruling class to manage the polity (public); educating the kings, adopting education systems to gain power over the polity, dichotomy of control, creating knowledge gaps to create “power”. 33m focus on significant and substantial, discard the arbitrary, dismiss the irrational. Sayers' biases and the basis of Christian Homeschooling in America. 34m Sayers' system as the “closest to the perfection of Plato's Republic” – Freemasonry 35m Christian Homeschooling and predefined grammar, infecting the logic by not asking preliminary questions to identify that which exists, reality from unreality (Sayers' seeds of irrationality) 36m History of Ideas in relation to the Trivium Method contrasted to the Classical Trivium and the history of creating organic unity 37m The Classical Trivium, Freemasonry as a feedback mechanism for creating organic unity through empire, “Builders of Empire: Freemasons and British Imperialism (1717-1927)” by Jessica Harland Jacobs 38m “Origins of Freemasonry” by Thomas Paine, 39m Johann Joachim Christoph “J.C.” Bode, Nicholas Bonneville, Philo's Reply to Questions Concerning His Association with the Illuminati by Jeva Singh-Anand, Illuminati Manifesto of World Revolution (1792) translated by Marco de Luchetti, 40m King Elfwad, Charlemagne, and the origins of the word “Trivium” by Alcuin of York 41m Ancient Greece, systems of preserving itself against surrounding piranha states 42m Enkyklios Paideia created by Isocrates preserves organic unity until Thomas Jefferson recognizes what it is, and what it does 43m Scott Buchanan and Stringfellow Barr (Rhodes Scholars) and Freemasonry, origins of “Classical Trivium” revival veiling the Enkyklios Paideia 44m filling in between Isocrates and the Freemasons, Jesuits and the Ratio Studiorum, which was rejected by John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, Ratio Studiorum as continuation of organic unity under godhead of theology. 45m Thomas Jefferson (post-revolution) goes to William and Mary and has the Classical Trivium removed from the curriculum, breaking the mechanism of British perpetuation of their organic unity 46m Thomas Jefferson addressing the Educational Perennialists of his day, accepting the theory before inspection, condemnation prior to observation, “putting your logic before your grammar” as Jan Irvin says 47m Education as a tool of creating culture, its how the state reproduces itself, “reality” filtered through he prescribed rhetoric of the state, 48m Ignatius Loyola, Alumbrados, the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius Loyola as the origins of the esoteric organic unity progressed by the Jesuits, various flavors of organic unity (various empires through time), sacrifice of the individual to the state 49m Bavarian Illuminati, Thomas Paine, Nicholas Bonneville, and connections to the origins of America, May 1, 1776, Adam Weishaupt (1911 Encyclopedia Britannica entry for Illumati), Baron Adolph ‘Philo' Knigge as Weishaupt's #2 in the Bavarian Illuminati 50m Bavarian Illuminati as intellectual group fighting against organic unity and divine right of kings in Europe. “Philo's Reply to Questions Concerning His Association with the Illuminati” Reply by Jeva Singh Anand reveals the personal conversations between Adam Weishaupt and Baron von Knigge prior to Knigge's resignation from the Bavarian Illuminati and the promotion of revolutionary publisher J.C. Bode. 51m Thomas Paine's references to Samuel Prichard's “Freemasonry is based on the foundation of the Liberal Arts” quote, Illuminati as a system trying to do away with the state, Isidore of Seville and the creation of civil polity by limited education 52m Bavarian Illuminati vs. Religion and the State, Freemasonry as the genitalia of the state and the injection of organic unity throughout indigenous populations, Illuminati plans to use for the state to reproduce itself via taking over Freemasonry. 53m the Strict Observance Lodge of Freemasonry in Bavaria, Degree Systems above traditional York Rite degrees, transcending nationhood. Reinhard Koselleck's “Critique and Crises : Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society” (published by M.I.T.) on Freemasonry and creating organic unity 54m Original members of the Illuminati influencing American education, The Ultimate History Lesson with John Taylor Gatto 55m Juxtaposing internet lore vs. actual artifacts and evidence of the Bavarian Illuminati, similar to Jesuits in seeing value of controlling education, 1610 Wood Manuscript (The Hiram Key by Lomas and Knight) 56m Individual Liberty based on that which exists vs. irrational illusions of Authority, Bonneville, Jefferson, and the unknown history of Bavarian Illuminati influence in America's origins. 57m Social Circle Freemasonic Lodge, papers published by J.C. Bode of the Bavarian Illuminati, promoted after Knigge's resignation, connections to Prussian education. 58m Johann Fichte's references to Johann Pestalozzi's organic unity method of schooling and creation of the Prussian education system, giving birth to Romantic Nationalism as opposed to the Jeffersonian ideas of nationhood. 59m Milton Peterson's works on Thomas Jefferson, rejection of classical forms of the Trivium as being connected to the Great Chain of Being, i.e. a caste society subjugating individuals to illusory authority 1h1m ideas of creating a balanced government based on first principles subject to existence, not dogma; derivative proofs of non-aggression undermined by changes in education system which Jefferson feared, J.J. Rousseau, John Locke, The Meaning of Meaning, particularity and universiality, from Charlemagne through to the 21st Century. 1h5m Jefferson displacing the Classical Trivium at the University of Virginia, Jefferson laments genocide of indigenous languages and loss of etymology. 1h6m encryption of language enables selective power transfer 1h8m how to preserve the first principles which inspired the Constitution 1h10m Ben Franklin's education in the liberal arts and secret societies 1h11m parallels of Isocrates and Freemasonic organic unity, “Builders of Empire” as blueprint for how Freemasonry assumes authority throughout the world 1h14m philosophic corruptions of reality, claims of authority break down under scrutiny and defined terms, taboo to discuss because you might perceive the ruse of organic unity 1h15m Thomas Jefferson displaces classical Trivium as being tied to the Great Chain of Being 1h16m Legacy of Alcuin of York, creating a duality in Christianity, “othering” of the natural world, Basil Bernstein's work on the classical Trivium, Noah Webster, John Adams, Thomas Paine, Emerson and Thoreau, Rousseau's social contract, liberal arts as chains of garland flung over reality, Bavarian Illuminati 1h17m Epistemological cartoons instead of getting into the details and artifacts, Techne (Technology) as a Craft to propel Culture (see: Freemasonry), Thomas Paine quote on education and knowledge of language vs. knowledge of things, Syntax and Statecraft in history 1h18m Destutt De Tracy “Elements of Ideology”, science of ideas from Condillac's Statue of Man, solidifying a science of ideas to map out human resource control 1h19m Destutt De Tracy: how to define and identify in order to think clearly and progress to understanding 1h20m Prussian Nationalism, Hegel and the obsolescence of the Divine Right of Kings and “Authority” in general, discovering that life is not how we were taught it is as a result of the Prussian education system changing America away from natural rights liberalism 1h21m systems of natural rights and state education are not compatible 1h22m unitary education by congress is in direct contradiction to the founding principles of America, collectivism, pre-amble missing from Constitution, ambiguity therefore included unnecessarily 1h24m Classical Trivium imparting language without defense against unreality, thus creates a system of control 1h25m without defense against unreality, society becomes skewed and actions in conflict with needs of survival, as a result of Enkyklios Paideia introduced into England by the Venetian Black Noblity 1h26m Webster Tarpley's 1981 article on the Venetian Black Nobility, how to fill in the blanks when history has been purposely omitted, creating cognitive dissonance 1h28m Wilhelm Wundt and the “Clockwork Orange” mentality of treating people as mechanical toys, to be manipulated; and how asking questions is the key to circumventing Wundtian control systems 1h30m Frederick the Great and the Gymnasium of Prussian Education, Obama's recent references to the value of Prussian industrial training 1h31m John Taylor Gatto's “Underground History of American Education” referring to Prussian indoctrination methods being used in America, Prussian principles displace American first princples imparted in Constitution 1h32m Prussian education creates a strong nationalistic fervor, at behest of “national” interest, parallels between Nazi Germany and America today via the Prussian education system 1h33m Frederick the Great, Freemasonry, Education, and Illuminati connections; going after our youngest through compulsory schooling, creation of schooling in America by secret societies 1h34m Frederick the Great May 1, 1786 creating constitutions of Freemasonry, similar degrees to draw people into the Illuminati plan by imitating Freemasonry 1h35m Reworking masonic texts to re-present the ideas to foment revolution, Amis Reunis, Lodge of the Nine Sisters, and the Social Circle, French Revolution, Congress of Wilhelmsbad, Baron Knigge and the attempts to recruit powerful figures into their stable of talent. Hegel, Herter, Mozart, Goethe, Zeitgiest (spirit of the age) 1h36m origin myth of the Nine Muses / Nine Sisters lodge of Freemasonry in France 1h37m Rev. George Washington Snyder letter to George Washington, Oct 24, 1798 regarding the Bavarian Illuminati, spores dispersed into America, Anti-Freemasonic Party to drive Freemasons from power 1h38m Cecil Rhodes and fellow Freemasons creating British organic unity via a Secret Society based on the methods of the Jesuits (Ratio Studiorum) 1h39m Ben Franklin and the Lodge of the Nine Sisters, representing the Nine Muses (9 liberal arts) as set down by Martianus Capella, Destutt De Tracy, Voltaire members of the lodge, Jefferson's rejection of their first principles, Positive vs. Negative origins of Government 1h40m Napoleon rejected the first principles as Jefferson did, Destutt De Tracy deposed from his educational system, Grammar, Logic, & Ideology (instead of rhetoric) 1h41m Jefferson's own contradictions (not perfect) but noted the success of America dependent on independence from British linguistic controls 1h42m Cecil Rhodes and the Jesuits, organic unity common to plans of monopoly, power, and empire, tracing back to the Indian (of India) monitorial schools (pedagogical control of group by authority at the front of the room), another brick in the wall as the craft of masonry Cecil John Rhodes PC, DCL (5 July 1853 – 26 March 1902) was an English-born South African businessman, mining magnate, and politician. He was the founder of the diamond company De Beers, and an ardent believer in British colonialism, he was the founder of the state of Rhodesia, which was named after him. He set up the provisions of the Rhodes Scholarship, which is funded by his estate. Rhodes and his legacy are memorialized in the 1966 textbook “Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time” by Dr. Carroll Quigley, professor at Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. 1h43m Cecil Rhodes goal to change American Constitution to bring America back under control of Britain by rings-within-rings, using Rhodes Scholars to create organic unity. 1h43m Cecil Rhodes plans grow roots in America, proliferating Anglo-Saxon Nationalism (everyone else was a “barbarian”) 1h44m Equal rights only for “civilized” men (positive rights) vs. natural rights inherent to all human beings 1h45m Cecil Rhodes Last Will and Testament, seeking to decontextualize the history and create amnesia in the American polity 1h46m Cecil Rhodes' band of merry men, bring in Prussian ideals via Rhodes Scholars, creating a spacial-temporal consciousness shift 1h47m Carroll Quigley's books addressing Rhodes and organic unity (Evolution of Civilizations, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, The Anglo-American Establishment), Porter Sargent's books on the same topic 1h48m Clarence Streit's “Union Now” plan to merge America with Britain, Andrew Carnegie's “Triumph of Democracy”, Linus Pauling's “Union Now” speech, Harris Wolford of the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society), Rhodes Roundtable group seeking to create a union of democracies, origins of Globalism, collaboration between Rhodes Roundtable, Rockefeller, Carnegie trusts. 1h49m undoing Thomas Paine's “Common Sense”, to reverse roles and undo common sense to say America is subservient to Britain 1h50m Clarence Streit, Stringfellow Barr, and Scott Buchanan, (all Rhodes scholars) reviving the Classical Trivium, indoctrinating Anglo-American values and organic unity 1h51m Rhodes Roundtable supports “Union Now”, via Pilgrims Society, also seeking Organic Unity with Britain, origins of Apartheid in South Africa, Jan Smuts and Wholism as the philosophy of the British Empire (plunder rebranded as freedom) 1h52m “Union Now” as a Fabian Society for Federalists to create organic unity, Embers of World Conversation (Buchannan), origins of The Great Books of the Western World with Richard McKeown 1h53 Marshall McLuhan and I.A. Richards work on the Classical Trivium, James Bryant Conant 1h54m Poetry and Mathematics by Scott Buchanan (Rhodes Scholar) rediscovers the Classical Trivium, John Erskine, Nicholas Murray Butler, St. Thomas Aquinas, Great Chain of Being, and Mortimer Adler and logic existing within systems, Dr. Randall Hart “Classical Trivium” book 1h55m John Erskine bringing selective reading into the U.S., Woodbury and the X Club (see: Huxley), Matthew Arnold and Cecil Rhodes 1h56m Alfred Zimmern, William Benton, Benton and Bowles Advertising trending organic unity 1h57m “Union Now” and the liberal education at St. John's University and the University of Chicago, Leo Strauss, Neocons, Robert Maynard Hutchins, and the origins of the Great Books of the Western World 1h58m Legacy of Cecil Rhodes, Pilgrims Society, RIIA, CFR, and creating organic unity in America 1h59m Arthur Balfour, Cecil Rhodes, Baron Rothschild and Palestine; Pilgrims Society as Anglo-American Alliance to usurp national government of the U.S. vis a vis Organic Union 2h re-branding British Empire as part of organic unity and role of St. John's university in revival of the Classical Trivium within the Anglo-American tradition. 2h2m “Fat Man's Class” and William Benton, J. Walter Thompson Company, Denise Sutton's “Globalising Ideal Beauty: How Female Copywriters of the J. Walter Thompson Advertising Agency Redefined Beauty for the Twentieth Century”, De Beers Diamond Cartel, behaviorism (via John Watson) included to manipulate populations 2h3m Encyclopedia Britannica bought by William Benton vs. The Great Books of the Western World, Benton worked with R. Gordon Wasson, Bank of International Settlements 2h5m Benton and “Fat Man's Class” sought to proliferate sophism into the business community, Henry Luce's support, “The Romance of Commerce and Culture”, Walter Paepke, importation of Prussian/German culture into business and politics, boxing up our culture to bring concensus by de-individualizing and holding conflicting thoughts is the norm. 2h7m Great Books of the Western World and Eugenics, signers of the GBWW project (several Union Now supporters & Rhodes Scholars among other collectivist groups seeking organic unity for Anglo-Saxon Establishment power structures) 2h9m Society for the Cincinnatus and the ominous continuity of these ideas, Mirabeau as a member of the Social Circle, hereditary orders to create organic unity, Walter Paepke as founder of the Aspen Institute which funded the GBWW, founded on commemoration date of Goethe, ex-Bavarian Illuminati; origin of Aspen's popularity and the Noble Lie 2h10m Leo Strauss at St. John's University as a Scott Buchanan Scholar 2h11m GBWW to impart culture to common man, a scarcity not circulated in 70 years, a legacy of organic unity being propagated via Classical Trivium 2h12m Joseph S. Nye, Jr. (Rhodes Scholar, Harvard), Power and Interdependence 2h13m London School of Economics (Fabian Socialist institution), Rothschild family funding LSE 2h14m “The Real New World Order” (Foreign Affairs Publication) by Anne-Marie Slaughter, Office for Policy Planning, CFR driving organic unity 2h15m “The Real New World Order” is published by the Council on Foreign Relations 2h16m David Rockefeller, Memoirs, p. 505 quote, Admiral Chester Ward on CFR quote from Barry Goldwater biography “With No Apologies” chapter 33 “Our Non-Elected Rulers” 2h17m H.G. Wells, Fabian Socialist, Open Conspiracy, Island of Dr. Moreau, organic unity through Eugenics (see: G. Stanley Hall quote on organic unity in “NEA: Trojan Horse”), erasing of national borders, ethically responsible to control the many, “The Shape of Things to Come” by H.G. Wells H.G. Wells' most consistent political ideal was the World State. He stated in his autobiography that from 1900 onward he considered a World State inevitable. He envisioned the state to be a planned society that would advance science, end nationalism, and allow people to progress by merit rather than birth. In 1932, he told Young Liberals at the University of Oxford that progressive leaders must become liberal fascists or enlightened Nazis in order to implement their ideas.[35]In 1940, Wells published a book called The New World Order that outlined his plan as to how a World Government will be set up. 2h18m Technocracy to control the thoughts of the polity, C.K. Ogden and I.A. Richards “The Meaning of Meaning”, imparting of Liberal Arts to create civil polity, language as technology to control polity 2h20m Inherent rights (negative rights) vs. Positive Rights (arcane laws of governance and authority), “Fire in the Minds of Men” by James H. Billington (Rhodes Scholar & Librarian of Congress), the need to preserve oral traditions and the attack of our culture to manipulate our perceptions, thus to create organic unity, the use of cybernetics to wage psychological warfare, using the mind as the harness of human resources, Stephen Biko “the most powerful weapon in the hands of the oppressor are the minds of the oppressed.” 2h22m Ludwig Wittgenstein, I.A. Richards, and manipulating language to control perceptions in cybernetics, Macy Conferences of cybernetic applications, and “New Criticism” to decontextualize historical documents, thus re-defining liberty by separating literature from history. Rhodes/Milner Roundtable participation in supporting “New Criticism” and decontextualizing history to create organic unity; which evolved from the Prussian Nationalism which preceded it. 2h25m Frank Aydelotte (Rhodes Scholar) on Classical Trivium and Organic Unity, “spelling” to use words to further “liberty” in British terms. 2h26m Lord Percy v. Thomas Jefferson, 2h27m Arnold Toynbee and analogical reasoning using the Classical Trivium to promote British organic unity 2h28m Eugenics, Rockefeller, and organic unity vis a vis “The Molecular Biology of Life: Caltech, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Rise of the New Biology ” by Lily Kay (M.I.T.) 2h29m Frank and James Angell, G. Stanley Hall, and others instrumental introducing the Prussian education system into America, John Taylor Gatto's work, Max Weber and scientific dictatorship 2h30m Population Control, Eugenics, and the Rockefeller “Science of Man” project rebranded as “molecular biology”, Linus Pauling's support of Lily Kay's book, Mr. and Mrs. Pauling support “Union Now” and other Anglo-American plans of unification, Delphi Technique of mind control, managing consent, Walter Lippmann 2h32m Rockefeller “Science of Man”, Edward Alsworth Ross' “Social Control”, mapping the individual to destroy individuality, Lily Kay unmasks the eugenic agenda of the elites, culling the polity to create organic unity. Artificial scarcity of technology, planned economies (Agenda 21) 2h33m SUMMARY: By changing the terms and definitions throughout history, the theme of controlling the polity by means of irrational means has thus far been successful. Our voluntary servitude to ideas which are unreality, continues to be the problem; learning and asking substantial questions and finding valid answers continues to be the solution. 2h34m Kevin Cole's closing statement, the logic behind the liberal arts education, slavery vs. free minds, the perpetuation of organic unity throughout time to create slave vs. free dichotomy. In America rights were inherent, not because you're become a subservient slave to the state. WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE?CHECK OUT "THE ULTIMATE HISTORY LESSON: A WEEKEND WITH JOHN TAYLOR GATTO"!Subtitled: A 5-hour journey examining the history, root-causes, and consequences of public schoolingAlternatively, you can also find The Ultimate History Lesson listed on Amazon.com.