Reflection Essay:

The first day of this course I was asked “what was rhetoric?” The next class period I was given an assignment to write a one page paper on what we thought our definition of rhetoric was. I sat down to try to think of something to type, and nothing. I thought to myself why I could not think of a simple definition of what rhetoric was and I am in a rhetoric class. Looking back at this assignment I can say that I did develop a solid definition of what I thought rhetoric was. As I was read through this paper I thought to myself “if a few things were to happen a little differently, rhetoric would possibly not be that talked about and I would not have had to write this paper”. My main interests when reviewing my E-portfolio were the post that dealt with rhetoric in Christian Europe. The fact that classical rhetoric was on the brink of extinction was very fascinating. This has allowed me to look at the course with an optimistic mind set and since it almost disappeared in certain places in Europe, examine why this was the case. I think it’s for the greater good that rhetoric it did not disappear: hence all the books and teachings about rhetoric. I also believe that the culture of Christian Europe enhanced my learning for the remainder of the course.

The existence of rhetoric in Christian Europe did not look very good at a certain time in history. There were certain places in Europe where rhetoric nearly vanished. There were a lot of things going on that caused chaos in this time from “the fall of the Roman Empire” to “the rise of Christianity” to the domination of the churches in almost every aspect of life. The Roman Empire at one point was enormous, covering some of northern Africa to Europe and all the way to some Asian territory. Since the empire was this large, it was only a given that the Europeans were acquainted more with roman rhetoric than any other type. The falling of this empire exposed Europe to a new type of empire, Christianity. Rhetoric created a lot of question and therefore people did not accept it right off the back. Some even went as far as to saying that it was “relating it to pagans” *E-portfolio post pg. 115*. Slowly but surely rhetoric made its way back into an unsuspected place, the church. This transformation brought rise to well-known historic figures like St. Augustine.

St. Augustine was born in northern Africa around the time of the fall of the Roman Empire.  Having a mother who was a “devout Christian” on top being “sent to Carthage to study rhetoric…” St. Augustine had experience with rhetoric and Christian cultures. The presence of his dual background allowed him to make many contributions during this Christian-Rhetoric European era. His teachings influenced many any were a mixture of Cicero’s rhetoric, which “shaped education, civic administration, private life, and church and the second sophists theory, which “rewarded delivery, style and ornamentation with little or no attention to substance” ”*pg117* meaning that they valued how things were said over what was said. St. Augustine is just one of the many well-known figures of this time. With the absence of rhetoric we would most likely not be seeing these important people along with their contributions/influences.

These contributions/influences had influences within themselves. The culture of this rhetorical, Christianized Europe had inserted innovative ways that shaped Europe and could be seen being applied on a real-life scale. The ideas/principles that I feel made the largest impact in this time were the three rhetorical arts in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries: arts of preaching, letter writing, and poetry. The art of preaching is used primarily when dealing with religion. Since the beginning of time all religions have been spread the same from a rhetorical outlook. There are some conveying the word, some believing the word, and some that don’t believe in the word: the preacher or pope, the believers, and the non-believers. It relies on verbal rhetoric to first allow the believers to fully grasp the religion and then to persuade the non-believers.

Letter writing is very significant and has showed its relevance my last assignment (research essay). Though it is not a letter I still saw some examples present. The one that grabbed my attention was something that took off five points my final grade, grammar/sentence structure. In the art of letter writing there is a manual that was usually used as a guide to help those with the basics of letter writing while teaching different forms. When going over my paper Professor McDonald said she had five criteria during here paper grading process: one of which was grammar/sentence structure. I automatically related her five criteria *FIND OUT THE CRITERIA* to the manual of letter writing. Also I felt that this was more important on a more broad scale. As an English major I am constantly being assigned papers for every class. Since every subject and teacher is different I came to an assumption that so will their criteria (manual). Knowing this manual guided me into becoming a better writer and possibly to better grades on my papers.