Feminist Rhetorical Criticism

Feminist Rhetorical Criticism (FRC for short later on when necessary) is a relatively new area of rhetorical studies. In her Rhetorical Criticism: Exploration and Practice, Sonja K. Foss defines Feminist Rhetorical Criticism as follows: rhetorical criticism done from a feminist perspective, then, is designed to analyze and evaluate the use of rhetoric to construct and maintain particular gender definitions for women and men. Created by the people who are seen as aberrant from the norm, already included in the norm, or insignificant in comparison to the norm (European-American men), FRC is considered unserious and put aside as insignificant. Female and feminist contributions to rhetorical theory construction, however, have a long history.This paper is intended to give a brief account of feminist rhetorical criticism in terms of its historical contexts and development and apply FRC to the analysis of its relationship with theological interpretive codes, women's social images and women's political discourses.The present paper is composed of an introduction, five chapters and a conclusion.A brief introduction sets out to define the following terms: feminism, feminist, rhetorical criticism and feminist rhetorical criticism.The first chapter gives a brief account of the historical background, development and major views of Feminist Rhetorical Criticism, including three assumptions(1. gender has been constructed so that women's experiences are subordinated to those ofmen—women are not allowed equal opportunities for self-expression; 2. women's persecutions, meaning, and experiences are valued; 3. research is conducted for the purpose of improving women's lives), four areas of study(1. revisionist history, in which overlooked female rhetoricians are written into rhetoric's history, male-authored texts are reread form a feminist perspective, and the outlines of rhetoric's history are re-evaluated; 2. redefinition of the theory and practice of rhetoric in order to include works by women who do not fit into traditional categories and to construct a field of rhetoric more equitable towards women, minorities, and other marginalized groups; 3. language study, in which women's ways of using language are explored to discern women's styles of speaking and writing, the patriarchal nature of language itself is analyzed in order to understand how language has perpetuated gender oppression, and alternative language styles are advanced; 4.recognition of women's oratory as a body of implicit rhetorical theory), and two stages (inclusion stage and revisionist stage). Of the two stages the inclusion involves the following four research areas: the study of sexism in language, differences in communication between women and men, great women speakers, and women's communication as a separate culture. Then the present paper goes on to cite some important feminist rhetors in history, such as Christine de Pizan, Mary Daly, Diotima, Sarah and Angelina Grimke, Winifred Bryan Horner, Hypatia, Sojourner Truth, Mary Wollslonccraft and Virginia Woolf. Besides a brief introduction to their life experiences, this chapter also explains their main ideas and masterpieces related to feminist rhetorical criticism.The second chapter examines how theological discourse createsparticular types of interpretive codes. Dominant religious communities rely upon received theological traditions to enforce hegemony of acceptable thought and action upon their members. Within that hegemonic structure, alternative communities offer oppositional interpretative codes to reinterpret the received theology and thus call into question the dominant tradition. Evangelical Christian feminist literature is examined as an exemplar of how one such alternative community articulates oppositional interpretive codes. The present chapter then takes upon itself to investigate hegemony and opposition in religious discourse by stressing the interplay among texts and audiences in creating meaning, and by highlighting the social dimensions of religious belief and spiritual experience.The third chapter takes as its main concern to analyze the strategic use of the dominant discourse just for the purpose of opposing the dominant discoure, a phenomenon seen in an early address by Emmeline Pankhurst, founder of the Women's Social and Political Union, the "militant" arm of the English women's suffrage movement. Rhetorically, all social movements are faced with the task of how to effectively alter the dominant discourse and its controlling images. Many social groups choose to directly confront the dominant discourse. In the course of some movements, however, there is a subtle, and at times short-lived, strategy of utilizing the very discourse to eventually change the discourse. Pankhursfs speech of "The Importance of the Vote", just a case at point, accepted rather than negating the ruling discourse and its view of women. This unusual tactic provides new insight into the ways in which people with or without power relate to the dominant discourse just for the purpose ofaffecting the discourse.The fourth chapter argues that congressperson Patricia Schroeder's political discourse reflects a gendered approach to decision-making that manifests prototypic characteristics of women's culture. Feminist concepts provide a framework for understanding Schroeder's voice on the political stage in that Schroeder's discourse emphasizes conception, context, and personal experience in making decisions. Finally, this chapter proposes that Schroeder's voices—as reflective of women's culture—provides direction for vital transformations in political decision making.In conclusion, we hope that this paper can give readers a general but relatively comprehensive impression of the factors and applications of feminist rhetorical criticism, although we are aware that further studies in more detail on this topic need to be made in the future.