The State of Speech: Rhetoric and Political Thought in Ancient Rome by Joy Connolly Details
The rhetorical theory, the essence of Roman teaching, studied the rules of modernity that are still influential today. But the Roman discourse has always been seen as less important in…
The rhetorical theory, the essence of Roman teaching, studied the rules of modernity that are still influential today. But the Roman discourse has always been seen as less important in talking about political ideas.
The state of speech presents a strong challenge to this view. The first book, which reads Roman scriptual writing as a style of political thought, focuses on the greatest practitioner in Rome and the generalist, Cicero.
Through the new readings of his dialogues and treatises, Joey Connolly shows how Cicero's handling of the central questions of Greek tradition was shaped by his example of the Republic and the citizen. Conoli says that rhetoric speaks to the most profound political concerns of Chichero: the formation of individual and collective identity, the communicative role of the body, and the "inappropriate" political aspects, particularly of civility and harmony.
Beyond the traditional lines between rhetorical and political theory, the "state of speech" is a major contribution to the current debate on the role of public discourse in Roman politics. Instead of a traditional top-down model of power, it paints a dynamic model of authority and approval that is adopted through rhetorical performance and teaches how to articulate the ethics of citizenship to the masses and elites.
He explains how the imperialist Roman preachers re-formed the ideal republican citizen of Szechro to meet the new political conditions of autocracy, and to defend Chokrone thought as a resource for contemporary democracy.
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