| dc.description.abstract | The dissertation will hinge on a discussion of the epideictic tradition in Athens and the way in which the Sophists and Plato worked within it for their own purposes. I will establish two strands or expressions of epideictic: a naive tradition and a self-conscious one. In the naive tradition, writers compose epideictic speeches--encomia, panegyric, funeral orations--artlessly and innocently. Through their encomia, they reaffirm unquestioningly the values and beliefs of their society, and they believe wholly in the ability of an epideictic oration to project these values unambiguously. These writer's texts are straightforward, saying what they mean at the outset, without hidden agenda. In the self-conscious tradition, writers compose epideictic speeches skeptically and consciously. Through their encomia they question and examine the values of their society, and they deny that an epideictic oration is capable of presenting values without ambiguity. These writer's texts pretend to be what they are not, hiding their meanings within the folds of praise or blame, paradoxically questioning the value of epideictic altogether. In Chapter Two, I examine the naive tradition of epideictic and interpret two examples of texts composed within this tradition, Pericles' funeral oration and Isocrates' "Encomium to Helen." In Chapter Three, I elaborate on the self-conscious tradition, practiced most notably by the Sophists. I detail their rhetorical strategies and the epistemology that enables them, finally offering a reading of Gorgias' "Encomium to Helen." In Chapter Four, I argue that Plato's Phaedrus and the Gorgias are encomia, and I interpret them in light of the naive epideictic tradition. Chapter Five offers a perspective of Plato as operating within the self-conscious tradition of epideictic, making full use of Sophistic strategies in his dialogues. Further, I examine how Plato takes the tradition one step further by calling Into question the Sophistic view of rhetoric. In the Conclusion I examine the implications of my work, suggesting applications of my method to other contexts and briefly questioning the relationship between ethics and rhetoric. | |
