ABSTRACT Title of Document: ARGUING OVER TEXTS: THE RHETORIC OF INTERPRETATION Kenton Martin Camper, Doctor of Philosophy, 2014 Directed By: Emeritus Professor Jeanne Fahnestock, Department of English This dissertation examines the nature of arguments over the meaning of texts. People often disagree about the meaning of texts, with arguments ranging from disagreements over individual words to disagreements over the text?s overall sense. Over two thousand years ago, rhetoricians in ancient Greece and Rome classified recurring types of disagreement over the meaning of texts. This classification, known as the legal stases, served as a tool for inventing arguments in favor of the arguer?s preferred interpretation. My dissertation recovers and adapts the legal stases as a modern rhetorical method for generating and analyzing arguments over the meaning of texts. In the first chapter, I sketch the history of the legal stases from their origins in ancient Greco-Roman legal discourse to their slide into obscurity in the seventeenth century. I rename them the interpretive stases because scholars can use them to analyze debates revolving around texts from a variety of spheres, including not only law, but also politics, religion, literature, and history. I adopt six interpretive stases: letter versus spirit, contradictory passages, ambiguity, definition, assimilation, and jurisdiction. These six stases offer a reasonably grained slicing of disputes over textual meaning at their roots: from a single word to how a text is applied in novel ways. In the next six chapters, I examine each interpretive stasis in detail with case studies from debates over textual meaning in a variety of settings. Case studies range from a controversy in literary criticism over the racially subversive nature of Phillis Wheatley?s poetry in the stasis of ambiguity to a debate in historical scholarship over Lincoln?s sexuality as inferred from his correspondence with an alleged male lover in the stasis of assimilation. In my final chapter, I suggest ways that literature and composition teachers might use the interpretive stases to help students analyze and generate arguments about texts, and I discuss promising intersections between my research and contemporary language science. Thus, my dissertation advances the ability of scholars to analyze the rhetorical dynamics of interpreting texts, trace the evolution of textual meaning, and examine how communities ground their beliefs and behaviors in texts. ARGUING OVER TEXTS: THE RHETORIC OF INTERPRETATION By Kenton Martin Camper Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2014 Advisory Committee: Professor Jeanne Fahnestock, Chair Professor Vessela Valiavitcharska Professor Michael Israel Professor Shirley Logan Professor Robert Gaines ? Copyright by Kenton Martin Camper 2014 ii Dedication To my parents for fostering in me rigorous and free thought, love, and faith. iii Acknowledgements There have been a number of people who have supported me throughout the process of completing this project whom I would like to thank. Undoubtedly, a list of all the people who have made this project possible, along with the ways they have supported me, would run longer than this dissertation. Of my academic mentors, I am perhaps most indebted to Jeanne Fahnestock, the director of this dissertation. Jeanne was an inspiration before I even came to Maryland. When I read her article ?Accommodating Science: The Rhetorical Life of Scientific Facts,? I thought to myself that I wanted to analyze language and texts with the same precision and insight that she did. I doubt I will ever attain that level of acumen, but any level I do attain is largely thanks to her and all that she has poured into me these past years. It was in Vessela Valiavitcharska?s Classical Rhetorical Theory class where I first stumbled across the interpretive stases. Her breadth and depth of knowledge is intimidating, but she shares it so generously. Her constant encouragement was a welcome lift during the long days and nights of being a Ph.D. student. Michael Israel has been a champion of my interest to bring together linguistics and rhetoric from the moment I stepped onto Maryland?s campus. His responses to my work are always razor sharp, making me rethink my projects in ways that enriched them, and I am grateful for our many conversations about language over coffee and lunch. Shirley Logan was the first person with whom I took a rhetoric and composition class at Maryland, and she has been one of my biggest champions ever since. Her aspirations for me stir me to reach higher than I originally imagined. I met Robert Gaines as a student in his argumentation theory iv class. I was taken with his deep knowledge of both classical and modern rhetorical theory as well as with his humor. Our conversations on campus and at conferences always leave me with much to ponder about issues in rhetoric or my future career. I received feedback on multiple chapters in this dissertation from my friends and colleagues in my writing group: Andy Black, Maria Gigante, Lindsay Dunne Jacoby, Heather Lindenman, and Heather Blain Vorhies. Their comments shaped my thinking and writing on this subject in tremendous ways. They have my gratitude. I am also grateful for my conversations about rhetoric and life with Bill Fitzgerald, Jeremy Metz, Cameron Mozafari, Kari Tremeryn, and many others inside and outside the academy. Although our time together has been relatively short, my partner Phil was one of my biggest supporters as I completed this project, cheering me on in the eleventh hour. I remain in awe of his deep intellect and genuine humility, and his sincere belief in both my work and me is a gift that cannot be repaid. My family, especially my parents, have supported my aspirations and me from day one. I can never thank my mom, dad, sister, and brother enough for their constant and unending love and encouragement. They are largely responsible for the habits of mind and body that allow me to do this work, and my interest in argumentation in the various spheres explored in this work grows out of my upbringing. Education really does begin at home. v Table of Contents Dedication .......................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... iii Chapter 1: An Introduction to the Interpretive Stases ................................................. 1 Intersections and Interventions in the Field .................................................................... 4 A Brief History of the Interpretive Stases ..................................................................... 11 Toward a Modern Version of the Interpretive Stases ................................................... 23 Chapter 2: Letter versus Spirit ..................................................................................... 27 The Rhetorical History of Letter versus Spirit .............................................................. 29 From Letter versus Intent to Letter versus Spirit .......................................................... 35 Persuasion within Letter versus Spirit .......................................................................... 43 A Letter versus Spirit Dispute over a Politically Charged Sound Bite ......................... 47 Theoretical Implications ............................................................................................... 53 Chapter 3: Contradictory Passages ............................................................................... 55 The Problem of Contradiction ...................................................................................... 57 Resolving Contradictions .............................................................................................. 63 Special Cases ................................................................................................................ 77 Defending Women?s Right to Preach by Solving Textual Contradictions ................... 80 What Can We Learn from Solutions to Textual Contradictions? ................................. 85 Chapter 4: Ambiguity ..................................................................................................... 88 Arguing over Ambiguity ............................................................................................... 92 The Four Types of Ambiguity and Their Subtypes ...................................................... 94 Marshalling Evidence from Convention, Context, and Background .......................... 104 Special Cases .............................................................................................................. 115 Rescuing a Poet?s Reputation with an Appeal to Intentional Ambiguity ................... 119 Ambiguity: An Opportunity for Openings and Shifts in Meaning ............................. 123 Chapter 5: Definition .................................................................................................... 126 Situational versus Interpretive Definitions ................................................................. 130 Definitions and Frames ............................................................................................... 132 Linchpin Terms ........................................................................................................... 136 The Scope of a Term: Conditions and Examples ........................................................ 139 The Topics of Usage and Effects ................................................................................ 143 A Definitional Dispute over the Term Privileges or Immunities/Rights .................... 147 Primary versus Secondary Stases................................................................................ 151 Chapter 6: Assimilation ................................................................................................ 154 Assimilation as Distinct from Letter versus Spirit ...................................................... 157 Exigence ...................................................................................................................... 159 Types of Assimilation ................................................................................................. 163 Analogical Reasoning about Texts ............................................................................. 168 vi Assimilation Creep...................................................................................................... 174 Strategies for Supporting or Refuting Assimilations .................................................. 177 Reading between the Lines for Lincoln?s (Homo)Sexuality ...................................... 197 Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 206 Chapter 7: Jurisdiction................................................................................................. 209 Preliminary Conditions for Interpreting a Text .......................................................... 212 Using the Preliminary Conditions of Interpretation as Lines of Arguments .............. 228 Debating the Eligibility of ?The Star-Spangled Banner? to Be the National Anthem 252 Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 258 Chapter 8: Zooming Out: Interrelations, Implications, and Conclusions ............... 260 The Intra-relations of the Interpretive Stases .............................................................. 263 The Interrelation of the Situational and Interpretive Stases ........................................ 272 Pedagogical Uses and Implications of the Interpretive Stases .................................... 277 The Cognitive Bases of the Interpretive Stases .......................................................... 282 The Theory of Interpretation Underlying the Interpretive Stases ............................... 285 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 289 1 Chapter 1: An Introduction to the Interpretive Stases In November 2009, over one thousand e-mails and two thousand documents were stolen from East Anglia University?s Climate Research Unit, located in the United Kingdom, and subsequently leaked online. The documents, dating from as early as 1996, were authored by dozens of leading climatologists who have argued that the average temperature of the earth has been rising at a potentially catastrophic rate as a result of human activity (Johnson). Critics argued that the leaked e-mails and documents revealed an effort by scientists to suppress evidence that the earth was indeed not warming. This scandal soon became known as ?climategate? and several parties who had been active participants in the debate over global warming offered interpretations of the leaked texts in service of their own agendas. One e-mail in particular received significant attention. Phil Jones, then head of the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia University, in a 1999 e-mail addressed to three of his colleagues, discusses how he treats data that would be published the following year. The following line from his e-mail received particular scrutiny: ?I?ve just completed Mike?s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd [sic] from 1961 for Keith?s to hide the decline.? According to one of the addressees, Michael Mann, Jones is explaining how he combined centuries of temperature-correlated data from tree rings, which are considered inaccurate after 1960, with more recent data from actual instruments (Grandia).1 After 1960, the tree-ring data diverges from the data from these instruments, the former indicating a decline in 1 Granted, Mann has a stake in this debate as well and is an interpreter like everyone else who reads these e-mails, however, it appears that his description of what Jones describes in his e-mail, ?Mike?s nature trick? is generally uncontroversial. 2 temperatures (Grandia). Jones replaced the divergent data with data from actual instruments, resulting in a graphical spike in global temperatures in the latter half of the 20th century, which is sometimes called a ?hockey-stick? diagram.2 Subsequently, controversy swirled around Jones? technique of combining data from different sources. Some skeptics of global warming seized on this line of text as an indication that climate scientists were exaggerating or even fabricating evidence for rising global temperatures. In one representative instance, Bradley Fikes, author of the North County Times Brad?s Sci-Tech Blog, noted, ?The plain wording of this Climategate email suggests deceit, but Professor Jones, now taking a leave of absence from the CRU [Climate Research Unit], says he was just speaking colloquially about how to solve a problem.? Fikes, like many other critics, zeroed in on the word ?trick? as a certain indicator of duplicity: ?The trick?was a deliberate deception to fool the science-ignorant. Had Jones not doctored the graph, that decline would have been on the front cover, where even science-illiterate reporters and policy makers (read: politicians) couldn?t miss it?. ?It?s the same trick used in ads where the supposed product benefits are boldly proclaimed, and the problems mentioned in the fine print. It?s the same trick used by scummy con artists. It has nothing to do with science.? For Fikes, the word ?trick? was not a guileless colloquialism but a sign that Jones had purposefully fudged the data. 2 For example, McIntyre. 3 Jones, however, was not without defenders. A post on the blog Real Climate: Climate Science from Climate Scientists, appearing soon after the stolen e-mails and documents were leaked, defends Jones? use of the word ?trick,? arguing, ??the ?trick? is just to plot the instrumental records along with reconstruction so that the context of the recent warming is clear. Scientists often use the term ?trick? to refer to a ?a [sic] good way to deal with a problem?, rather than something that is ?secret?, and so there is nothing problematic in this at all? (Schmidt). One locus of the debate over the meaning of Jones? e-mail, then, hinged on whether the word ?trick? was insidious or innocuous. This kind of interpretive dispute over the intended sense of a word in a particular context can be classified according to the system that is the subject of this dissertation. Indeed, this incident, as an illustration of disputes that can arise over the interpretation of a text, leads us to ask several questions: How do such divergent views of a widely available, accessible, and circulated text arise? What is it about the nature of texts and their relationship to human minds and communities that can give rise to these disputes? Are there any discernible patterns in these conflicts over interpretation? And if so, can they be classified? In other words, can we predict how people disagree over the interpretation of a text? How do rhetors then persuade audiences to accept their interpretation of a text when there are other competing interpretations? What specific tactics are at the rhetor?s disposal in these conflicts or disputes? Do rhetoricians have any available methods to understand and analyze such disputes? The answer to the last question, which can then help us begin to explore the others, is yes. As rhetoricians we do have a system available for understanding and 4 analyzing disputes over written texts and other kinds of recorded discourse, but this theoretical apparatus has been largely ignored by rhetorical scholarship in recent times. In antiquity, rhetoricians devised stasis theory as a way to help orators determine general, recurring points of disagreement that can arise in debates or disputes. These kinds of central points of disagreement are collectively called the stases (singular: stasis). As part of this doctrine, the ancients also outlined a series of general, recurring points of disagreement that can arise in disputes over the interpretation of a written document. This latter set of issues constitutes what have been traditionally called the legal stases. However, given the fact that they are not confined to legal documents, as originally conceived, I term them the interpretive stases or stases of interpretation. Giving them a robust, modern treatment, my dissertation presents the ancient and largely neglected interpretive stases as a theoretically rich, analytically viable, field-independent heuristic for the invention and analysis of interpretive arguments.3 Intersections and Interventions in the Field Stasis Theory in the 20th Century (Revival) Stasis theory, a major mode of invention from ancient times through the Early Modern period, has since the mid-20th century been at least in part recovered, revived, and reconfigured. Important scholarly energy has been expended tracing its origins and 3 The phrase ?field-independent heuristic of invention? is consciously taken from Fahnestock and Secor (?Toward a Modern Version of Stasis? 217). They use this phrase to describe the rational stases, the legal stases? sisters, in their rehabilitation of the same. 5 development,4 adapting the theory for modern rhetorical situations,5 and finding ways to make the theory relevant for the contemporary writing classroom.6 These efforts have been largely successful in partially resurrecting a once neglected theory for the purposes of historical insight, analysis, and pedagogy. Despite these gains, the recent project of rehabilitating stasis theory has been incomplete, for a significant part of the stasis system, the interpretive stases, has been largely neglected. Today rhetoricians are most likely familiar with the ancient stases of conjecture, definition, quality, and jurisdiction, and probably the modern additions of cause/effect and action.7 Few, however, are familiar with the stases of letter and spirit, conflicting laws, ambiguity, or assimilation. While many rhetoricians may have encountered these terms in other contexts, most would not associate them with the classical stasis system. Yet in ancient times, and as late as the 16th century, these were all considered stases. In Greek and Roman rhetorical theory, the stases were in fact divided into two classes: the better-known ?rational? stases?conjecture (or fact), definition, quality, jurisdiction?and the ?legal? or interpretive stases?letter and spirit, conflicting laws, ambiguity, definition, assimilation, and jurisdiction (Nadeau, ?Classical Systems of Stases in Greek? 70-71). Developed for legal oratory, these two classes of stases corresponded to two kinds of questions that could arise in a courtroom setting: those over the facts of the case and those that could arise over the interpretation of legal documents, such as wills, contracts, 4 For example, Heath, Menander; Heath, ?The Substructure of Stasis-Theory;? Nadeau, ?Classical Systems of Stases in Greek;? Nadeau, ?Hermogenes on ?Stock Issues? in Deliberative Speaking;? Dieter. 5 For example, Fahnestock and Secor, ?Toward a Modern Version of Stasis.? 6 Fahnestock and Secor, A Rhetoric of Argument: Brief Edition. 7 The stases of cause/effect and action were added by Fahnestock and Secor (?Toward a Modern Version of Stasis? 221-223). 6 and laws. The former set of issues was classified as the rational stases, which I call the situational stases because they are concerned with the contingencies of the situation in question. The latter set of issues was classified as the legal stases, here referred to as the interpretive stases, because they concern the interpretation of texts. In surveying modern scholarship on stasis theory, the neglect of the stases of interpretation becomes glaringly apparent. Antoine Braet?s 1987 article, ?The Classical Doctrine of status and the Rhetorical Theory of Argumentation,? for example, which attempts to explain what a theory of argumentation would look like with the concept of stasis at its core, only refers to the situational stases, making no mention of the legal stases. Wayne Thompson, in ?Stasis in Aristotle?s Rhetoric,? searches for evidence of the theory, albeit in nascent form, in Aristotle?s Rhetoric, but only looks for the situational stases, ignoring the appearance of the interpretive stases altogether.8 Michael Carter, looking to stasis theory as a rhetorical foundation for social constructionist views of discourse and knowledge, never refers to the interpretive stases, which would arguably greatly support his case. Only Kathy Eden studies the interpretive stases in any depth in recent scholarship, tracing their history and influence from ancient Roman law to 16th century Protestantism in Hermeneutics and the Rhetorical Tradition: Chapters in the Ancient Legacy and Its Humanist Reception. She does not, however, study their place within the rhetorical stasis system in depth. Hence, the work of these theorists represents the general neglect of the interpretive stases, even in scholarship that is devoted to stasis theory. In rehabilitating the interpretive stases for modern usage, then, this dissertation continues a larger scholarly project that began over half a century ago. 8 To my knowledge, no scholarship exists which recognizes the appearance of the legal stases albeit in nascent form in Aristotle?s Rhetoric. 7 Rhetoric and Hermeneutics This dissertation also stands at the intersection of rhetoric and hermeneutics, where rhetorical scholars have attempted to address the problem of analyzing interpretive arguments. In the final two decades of the last century, Steven Mailloux and Michael Leff devised two complementary conceptual frameworks for understanding the relationship between interpretation and persuasion. Mailloux offers rhetorical hermeneutics as ?a rhetorical approach to specific historical acts of cultural interpretation? (Mailloux, ?Rhetorical Hermeneutics Revisited? 233). In Mailloux?s rhetorical hermeneutics, ?shared interpretive strategies?[are viewed] as historical sets of topics, arguments, tropes, ideologies, and so forth, that determine how texts are established as meaningful through rhetorical exchanges? (Mailloux, ?Rhetorical Hermeneutics? 629). Leff, in response to Mailloux, presents hermeneutical rhetoric (196).9 Leff is especially concerned with rhetorical production, and thus hermeneutical rhetoric ?focuses upon interpretation as a source of invention and suggests how traditions can be altered without destroying their identity? (203-204). Leff explains, ?As the embodied utterances of the past are interpreted for current application, their ideas and modes of articulation are reembodied, and old voices are recovered for use in new circumstances? (203). Leff seeks to understand how rhetors manage to use traditional texts in the service of contemporary persuasion, without destroying the value of those texts. Both Mailloux and Leff illustrate how to work within their conceptual frameworks to analyze interpretive arguments, Mailloux with the reception of the novel 9 Leff considers hermeneutical rhetoric a counterpart to Mailloux?s rhetorical hermeneutics. 8 Huckleberry Finn10 and abolitionist versus pro-slavery interpretations of the Bible,11 Leff with Abraham Lincoln?s ?Gettysburg Address.?12 Neither, however, outlines a detailed method for carrying out such an analysis. While conceptually it is important to understand how they connect hermeneutics and rhetoric, replicating their approach with other samples of discourse remains difficult. Mailloux?s and Leff?s concepts, although they frame interpretive arguments in important ways, do not provide analysts with a means of labeling and categorizing arguments. In other words, their concepts offer no defined way to perform fine-grained rhetorical analysis, which would deepen our understanding of interpretive arguments. On the other hand, just as the situational stases have provided rhetoricians a standard, field-independent means of discussing and analyzing debates in general, the interpretive stases could likewise provide a standard, field-independent means of discussing and analyzing debates over textual interpretation. Equipped with the interpretive stases, scholars interested in debates over texts could recognize common rhetorical moves within and between particular debates, genres, media, communities, even individuals, enabling not only more in-depth analyses but also comparative studies that are more difficult to conduct without a standard set of terms. Meaning Construction This dissertation is also situated within linguistic scholarship on meaning construction that has developed over the latter half of the last century, maturing with 10 Mailloux, Rhetorical Power 100-129. 11 Mailloux, ?Rhetorical Hermeneutics Revisited? 246. 12 Leff, ?Hermenutical Rhetoric? 204-212. 9 intense vigor into the twenty-first. A growing number of language theorists believe that meaning is a consequence of a number of factors, including language use, linguistic context, extra-linguistic context, the language user?s knowledge of the language, and the language user?s previous experience.13 Meaning is not simply a function of linguistic form, but depends on how language users employ linguistic forms in any given context. Meaning is the result of dynamic social and cognitive processes. Researchers interested in the processes and properties of meaning construction have studied how language users construct meaning in a variety of settings and circumstances: storytelling (Turner); courtroom discourse (Coulson); riddles, billboard advertisements, computer-human interaction, and rituals (Fauconnier and Turner). One setting or situation that has received relatively less investigative attention from these researchers is the public interpretation of shared texts, the situation of multiple readers dialogically co-constructing the meaning of a single text. In literate societies especially, where there is a proliferation of written or printed texts, such situations are rather common, and, as I attempted to illustrate with the introductory anecdote, can have significant consequences. They are of further interest to scholars of meaning construction because they offer discrete instances of humans co-constructing the meaning of perceptually shared objects and could potentially illuminate such processes as they involve non-textual objects. Because the co-construction of meaning involves at least an attempt at reconciling multiple perspectives, the process necessarily involves persuasion. In the situations under discussion here, i.e. interpretive disputes, parties try to persuade each other to accept or 13 For example, Fauconnier; Coulson; Croft and Cruse; Evans. 10 reject certain interpretations. Because persuasion is involved in this process, a rhetorical approach that takes into account moves of persuasion is in order. The interpretive stasis system offers such an approach as it not only pinpoints the kinds of disagreements that arise in constructing the meaning of a text, but it also lists several possible means of persuasion, categorized according to the kind of interpretive dispute, that can be involved in the process. By bringing the interpretive stases to bear on this particular situation of meaning construction, I demonstrate that rhetoric has an important but neglected14 role to play in research on meaning construction. The co-construction of meaning, in particular, requires that the parties involved harmonize their unique, subjective visions of the world. This process of harmonizing has traditionally been the purview of rhetoric. Persuasion is after all the process by which individuals attempt to align their worldviews. But contemporary language scholarship can enrich the rhetorical approach by offering theoretically grounded approaches to the social and cognitive forces that shape how people argue over texts. With rhetoric we can pinpoint the argumentative and persuasive dimensions of those forces. To be sure, I am not delving into linguistic issues in detail in this dissertation, but am using contemporary language theory to help illuminate the cognitive and linguistic grounds for disagreements over texts and for the resolution of those disagreements. I thus put forward the interpretive stases and my elaboration of them as an extension of meaning construction in the context of textual interpretation. Contemporary language theorists whose work on meaning construction I build on include Herbert Clark, Gilles 14 Exceptions include Seana Coulson, Todd Oakley, and Mark Turner. 11 Fauconnier, J. L. Austin, H. P. Grice, and John Searle. Still we must recognize that the interpretive stases developed within the humanist tradition of rhetoric. It is to that development and history that I now turn. A Brief History of the Interpretive Stases15 Classical Development and Continuity The origins of the interpretive stases along with the interpretive topics, as they appear in their first attested form, are somewhat obscure. They are almost undoubtedly rooted in the classical judicial system. One possible and particularly striking source may be the 4th century B.C. Athenian trial-like procedure for revising the law code (Hansen 168).16 Once the Assembly decided that a law needed revision, any citizen could make a proposal for changing the law (Hansen 168). He would then go as an accuser of the law before a legislative body called the nomothetai (literally the law setters) who would act as jury (Hansen 169). Five representatives of the people nominated by the Assembly would also appear before the nomothetai to defend the existing law (Hansen 168-169). After both parties had made their cases, the nomothetai would vote on whether to change the law or maintain the status quo (Hansen 169). This process would encourage the identification of problematic points of interpretation in the legal text. Another, perhaps more likely, source for the interpretive stases and their topics is the ancient Athenian court system, the dikasterion or the ?People?s Court,? in which parties in a lawsuit 15 Currently there exists no detailed account of the development of the interpretive stases from their origins to their present state. A detailed account is not attempted here but rather a brief sketch. 16 Walker suggests this procedure may have been the model for the law exercises found in later progymnasmata, and while I agree, I suggest this procedure may have had an even more profound legacy (Chapter 3, 48-49). 12 incorporated written laws and other legal documents into their speeches as evidence (Hansen 178, 200-201). In any case, the formal interpretive stasis system probably began as a loose collection of generally recognized strategies for manipulating the written law and eventually other legal documents to suit one?s case. Sophists who were formerly logographers or courtroom speechwriters, like Antiphon, Isocrates, and Lysias, probably began teaching their students these strategies in order to prepare them for civic life.17 Evidence of this kind of instruction can be found in later extant progymnasmata or preliminary exercises, in which we find law exercises.18 These law exercises contain strategies that are strikingly similar to those found in more systematic treatments of the interpretive stases. As these strategies were written down and taught, patterns no doubt emerged, and more systematic approaches to manipulating legal documents were developed. Although in all likelihood the interpretive stases developed separately from the situational stases, at some point, probably in the 3rd or 2nd century B.C.,19 and certainly by the time of 17 Lawyers did not exist in the ancient Athenian legal system. Adult male citizens were expected to represent themselves, or their female relatives, in court before large juries of other Athenian male citizens (Kennedy, Classical Rhetoric 20). 18 See Kennedy?s Progymnasmata which includes English translations of the preliminary exercises of Aelius Theon, pseudo-Hermogenes, Aphthonius, and Nicolaus, all of which include law exercises. Although the earliest extant set of preliminary exercises, Aelius Theon?s, only dates to the 1st century A.D., it is generally accepted that some form of such exercises were taught as early as the 4th century B.C. (Kennedy, Classical Rhetoric 26). Walker specifically argues that Isocrates may have assigned some kind of law exercise to his students (Chapter 3, 49). 19 According to Walker?s reconstruction of his stasis system, Isocrates may have taught a sub-stasis of legality under the stasis of quality (Chapter 3, 69-70). If Walker were correct, the association and unification of the interpretive and situational stases would have taken place in the 4th century B.C., perhaps by Isocrates himself. While possible, the 13 Hermagoras of Temnos (2nd century B.C.), the similarities between these two classifications of arguments were recognized and rhetoricians began to teach and write about these two classifications together. Eventually this association would develop into a theoretical under girding uniting both classifications. Earlier versions of stasis theory, however, even though they recognized the theoretical similarities between the two classifications, were in disagreement about the status of the interpretive stases as stases proper. While there are certainly earlier examples of writers arguing in one interpretive stasis or another, which of course does not necessarily guarantee a theoretical understanding of interpretive disputes, the earliest plausible extant theoretical account of the interpretive stases, albeit in proto-form, can be found in Aristotle?s Rhetoric. While previous scholarship has recognized the existence of the situational stases in Aristotle,20 no scholarship exists, to my knowledge, which recognizes the existence of the interpretive stases in this text. To be sure, we do not have a coherent treatment of the interpretive stases in this text, but we do find evidence of a nascent form of a classification of interpretive disputes. We find a proto-theory of the interpretive stases in two places in the Rhetoric: in Chapters 13 and 15 of Book I. Chapter 15 is probably the clearest articulation of a theory of the interpretive stases. Here Aristotle discusses the inartistic proofs, which include written laws. Aristotle frames his discussion of written laws by writing that he will explain ?how they can be used in exhorting and dissuading and accusing and defending? unsystematic nature of the proto-stasis theory found in Aristotle?s Rhetoric, in which the two sets of stases are not integrated, places doubt on an earlier date. 20 For example, Thomspon. 14 (I.15.3).21 What follows is a list of topics, or rhetorical strategies, for doing just that (I.15.3-12). In his discussion of these topics, Aristotle mentions two situations that rhetors use to their advantage: when a law contradicts another law or contradicts itself and when a law is ambiguous (I.15.9-10). It would be a stretch to argue that Aristotle recognizes these two situations as general points of disagreements in disputes over legal documents, but it is important to note their appearance for the sake of understanding the development of the theory. In chapter 13, we find instances of two other proto-interpretive stases. The first is definition. Previous scholarship has already recognized the appearance of the situational stasis by the same name (Thompson 136). Intertwined with questions of determining the criminal category of an action are also questions of the meaning of legal terms (I.13.9). It is these latter questions that will eventually emerge as the interpretive stasis of definition. Although the conflation of situational and interpretive stases of definition is not uncommon in antiquity, there is clearer separation in later treatments of stasis theory. In this same chapter, Aristotle discusses one of the major limitations of written law: written law cannot adequately address particular cases (I.13.12-14). As a solution to this limitation, Aristotle prescribes fairness or ?justice that goes beyond the written law? (I.13.13). According to Aristotle, fairness, or going beyond the law, demands that jurors ?look not to the law but to the legislator and not to the word (logon) but to the intent (dianoian) of the legislator (I.13.17; emphasis). In championing fairness, Aristotle distinguishes between the words of the law and the lawmaker?s intent. While Aristotle shows no cognizance of this division as a possible issue of contention, this division, along 21 All English translations of Aristotle?s Rhetoric are taken from Kennedy?s 2007 translation of the text, while the Greek is taken from Freese?s 1959 text. 15 with contradictory passages, ultimately has the most consistent appearance as a stasis in treatments of in the interpretive stases throughout the centuries. Thus, while we find the proto-interpretive stases of contradictory passages, ambiguity, definition, and letter versus spirit (or rather, intent), Aristotle cannot be credited with the first coherent system of the interpretive stases. That distinction should be given to Hermagoras of Temnos, who is also credited with one of the most highly influential systematic treatments of stasis theory.22 By identifying the type of issues at the center of debates, he added an important layer to how ancient and subsequent rhetoricians conceptualized and carried out the invention of arguments. However, little is known specifically about Hermagoras? system, since his work has been lost, and his theory can only be reconstructed from later sources. It does appear that his system included four ?legal questions? (nomika x?t?mata), namely letter and spirit, or rather word and exception (kata rh?ton kai hupexairesin), contrary laws (antinomia), ambiguity (amphibolia), and assimilation (syllogismos) (Nadeau 60-61). In Hermagoras, we have the earliest attested example of the close association of the situational and interpretive stases, although he did not, as far as we know, consider the latter stases proper (Nadeau, ?Classical Systems of Stases in Greek? 60). The earliest extant systematic treatment of the interpretive stases, then, is found in the later Rhetorica ad Herennium, an early 1st century B.C. handbook. The most inclusive of the ancient rhetorical treatises, it lists six perennial issues that can arise in disputes over the meaning of a text: written text and intent (scriptum et sententiam), conflicting laws (contrarias leges), ambiguity (ambiguum), definition (definitionem), jurisdiction 22 See Nadeau 53; Heath, ?Prolegomena? 19; Heath, Menander 5; Kennedy, Classical Rhetoric 99-100. 16 (translationem), and assimilation (ratiocinationem) (I.XI.19).23 Here, the six interpretive stases are integrated into the larger stasis system as subtypes of the second of three stases: conjectural, legal, and juridical24 (I.XI.18). The author also includes a large list of topics, or strategies of persuasion, for each interpretive stasis (II.IX.13-II.XII.18). While the interpretive stases are still not fully systematized, the theory is at an advanced stage of development at this point. The major rhetorical works of Cicero closely follow the Rhetorica ad Herennium, thus marking the beginning of three centuries of systematization of the theory. Cicero?s treatment of the interpretive stases is inconsistent. His inconsistency, while certainly representing the fluidity of his own thought throughout the course of his life, probably also indicates that the theory had not yet solidified. His most inclusive account of the interpretive stases is found in his earliest work, De Inventione, where he lists five stases of interpretation: written text and intent (de scripto et sententia), conflicting laws (ex contrariis legibus), ambiguity (ambiguum), reasoning by analogy (ratiocinativum), and definition (definitionavum nominamus) (I.XIII.17). ). In his later works, Topica and De Oratore, Cicero reduces the number to three: written word and intent, conflicting laws, and ambiguity (Topica XXV-XXVI.95-96 and De Oratore I.XXXI.140).25 In contrast to the author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium, Cicero throughout his works consistently maintains a distinction between the stases proper and documentary disputes (scrpiti 23 Although I am drawing from Caplan?s text, which includes an English translation, I have made some modifications, so that the English better reflects the nuances of the Latin, and therefore the development of the theory. 24 The juridical stasis most closely accords with the stasis of quality in other systems. 25 See Topica XXV-XXVI.95-96 and De Oratore I.XXXI.140. In Orator XXXIV.121, Cicero reduces the number of documentary disputes to two, subsuming word and intent under the category of ambiguity. Topica, it should be noted, was written after Orator, and perhaps represents Cicero?s more mature or seasoned views on the subject. 17 controversia), although he closely associates the two (De Inventione X.XIII.17) or ?disputes about a law? (legitimae disceptationes) (Topica XXV.95). Cicero asserts that they are separate from the situational stases (separata sunt a constitutionibus) (De Inventione X.XIII.17) and calls them quasi-stases (quasi status) (Topica XXV.95). While Cicero gives more condensed treatments of the interpretive stases in his later work, his treatment in De Inventione is rather elaborate and like the Rhetorica ad Herennium includes a large list of topics for each stasis. Notably, both Cicero and the anonymous author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium present the earliest extant examples of expanding the scope of the legal issues beyond disputes over laws to not only other legal documents but to any written document (Rhetorica ad Herennium II.IX.13; Topica XXVI.96). This expansion meant that the interpretive stases could be applied to non-judicial discourse. The term ?legal,? the traditional name for these stases, then becomes somewhat of a misnomer, which is why I insist on the term interpretive instead. In the next century, Quintilian?s Institutio oratoria represents an advancement in the theory and systematization of the interpretive stases. Incorporating the interpretive stases, as questions, 26 into the larger stasis system under the division of the legal stasis, Quintilian attempts to elucidate the relationship between the situational stases and the interpretive stases, along with how the interpretive stases themselves are interrelated amongst themselves (3.6.66-67; 3.6.88; 7.10.1-4). He officially lists five legal questions? letter and intent (scripti et voluntatis), conflict of laws (legum contrariarum), 26 Quintilian declares that the interpretive stases are actually not stases but questions (3.6.67). Later, he writes that students may call them issues, questions, or minor headings (3.6.89). 18 inference/assimilation/?collection? (collectivum), ambiguity (ambiguitatis), and transference (tralationis)27 (3.6.67)?and later states that definition, which he includes as a logical (situational) stasis also belongs to the legal questions, bringing his list to six (3.6.68). Like Cicero and the anonymous author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium before him, Quintilian provides a list of topics for each of the interpretive stases. Addtitionally, he includes a helpful survey of previous opinion on the subject, thus preserving what otherwise would have been lost. While Quintilian?s work certainly represents an advancement, the culmination of the theory?s development is found in the work of Hermogenes of Temnos. Hermogenes? version of stasis theory, as presented in his work On Stases, remained canonical for centuries as a standard school textbook in both the West into the Middle Ages and Renaissance and the Byzantine East (Heath, Menander 10, 43; Nadeau, ?Classical Systems of Stases in Greek? 66, 71). Hermogenes presents a thirteen-stasis system in which the legal stases are, with one exception, fully-fledged stases, completely integrated into the stasis system. In Hermogenes? system, the stasis of quality is divided into two: logical and legal. The interpretive stases constitute the legal branch, which consists of four stases: letter and intent (rh?ton kai dianoian), assimilation (syllogismos), ambiguity (amphibolia), and conflict of law (antinomia) (40-41).28 Hermogenes? system also represents a further progression in the systematization of the legal stases as they, along with all the stases, are each presented with an ordered, step-by-step, argumentative outline for effective courtroom strategy. When rhetors 27 Later, he uses the term praescriptione (7.5). 28 Although Heath?s English translation was primarily consulted, the Greek is taken from Rabe?s text. 19 recognize that a current debate is in one of the stases, they can turn to these particularized outlines for rhetorical guidance. While each stasis has its own unique outline consisting of heads or divisions, argumentative moves the rhetor should make in ideal cases, there are shared heads between the stases. Essentially, Hermogenes? system represents a more structured version of the stases? various topics. Subsequent tradition followed models constructed in the classical period with little additional innovation or deviation. Table 1 offers a chart denoting self-declared lists of interpretive stases as found in several major rhetorical treatises. After Hermogenes, many treatises offer a four or five interpretive stasis system. Jursidiction is the most frequently omitted interpretive stasis followed by definition, most likely because they are included among the situational stases. Many treatises often include the interpretive form of these stases within their situational designations. There are exceptions to these common systems, but they are not typical. We also see later rhetoricians applying the legal stases to realms outside of law, like religious discourse, but even in these cases they were building on a system already constructed by the ancients. Stases/ Rhetorics Letter versus Spirit Conflict of Laws Ambiguity Definition Assimilation Jurisdiction Aristotle?s Rhetorica (c. 300s B.C.) (X) (X) (X) (X) Rhetorica ad Herennium (c. 84) X X X X X X Cicero?s De Inventione (c. 91) X X X X X Quintilian?s Institutio Oratoria (95 A.D.) X X X X X 20 Hermogenes? On Issues (c. 100s) X X X X X Gaius Julius Victor?s Ars rhetorica (c. 300s) X X X X [Augustine]?s De rhetorica (c. 300s) X X X X Capella?s The Marriage of Philology and Mercury (c. 410-439) X X X X X Boethius? De Topiciis (c. 523) X X X X X Cassiodorus? Institutiones (c. 551) X X X X X Isidore?s Etymologies (c.615-636) X X X X X Alcuin?s Rhetoric (794) X X X X Melanchthon?s Elementorum Rhetorices Libri Duo (1531) X X X X X X Erasmus? Ecclesiastes (1535) X X X X Farnaby?s Index Rhetoricus (1625) X X X X X Table 1. The interpretive stases through the ages. 21 Discontinuity and Obscurity Yet, after centuries of continuity in the rhetorical tradition, the interpretive stases appear to fall into obscurity sometime in the late seventeeth century. While a full investigation into the causes for this lapse in the tradition remains outside the scope of this dissertation, I suggest that this discontinuity is related to larger noted shifts in the rhetorical tradition at the time, a shift towards logic and what were believed to be sound methods of proof with a disregard for traditional methods of rhetoric which were believed to be untrustworthy (Kennedy, Classical Rhetoric 261). While the abandonment of the interpretive stases and their respective topics in the rhetorical tradition then is not surprising given this shift, we might expect their survival in the various branches of hermeneutics that had begun to develop over the centuries, which they undoubtedly influenced: philosophical, theological, and juridical.29 However, we do not find a wholesale survival of the interpretive stasis system in these intellectual areas either. In the cases of the first two, the absence of the interpretive stases is due, at least in part, to similar intellectual shifts during roughly the same period of time. We see in the work of Friedrich Schleiermacher, for example, who stood in the line of both philosophical and theological hermeneutics in the 19th century, a more general art of hermeneutics in contrast to what he saw as ?various specialized hermeneutics? (1). Although he was steeped in the rhetorical tradition, and his theory is greatly influenced by it, the interpretive stases would no doubt be included as one of the ?special methods? of the ?specialized hermeneutics? that Schleiermacher was attempting to construct a theory in contrast to (15.2). Their exclusion as a system to explain 29 I take this division from Grondin (1). 22 interpretive disputes no doubt nailed the coffin shut on the interpretive stases as a feature of Western philosophical hermeneutics, as theorists from Schleiermacher forward attempted to theorize a more general theory of human interpretation that sought to explain how humans interact with the world, not just written texts. In theological hermeneutics, in contrast to earlier works on preaching and biblical interpretation by figures like Erasmus and Melanchthon, we see that the interpretive stases are absent in major hermeneutic and homiletic treatises in the seventeenth centuries forward, such as Fran?ois F?nelon?s Dialogues concerning Eloquence in General and Particularly that Kind which Is Fit for the Pulpit (1718), David Fordyce?s Theodorus: A Dialogue concerning the Art of Preaching (1752), George Campbell?s Lectures on Pulpit Eloquence (1807), and Austin Phelps? The Theory of Preaching: Lectures on Homiletics (1895). At most we find a collection of topics for expounding on the meaning of the Scriptures or answering the objections of an imagined adversary regarding Scriptural interpretation (e.g. Campbell X), which bear little and at best incidental resemblance to the traditional topics of the interpretive stases. A theorized classification of interpretive disputes seems to have virtually disappeared, and thus the interpretive stases were no longer taught as part of hermeneutical or homiletic education in the Christian Church. Lastly, we might expect to find the interpretive stasis system in juridical hermeneutics, that is the realm of law. However, while rhetoric and law had at the very least a cross-pollinating relationship through the sixteenth century, that relationship began to fray in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, especially in Britain, where developments in legal system procedures and rules of evidence diminished ?opportunities for legal oratory? (Frost 11). This general disconnect has persisted into our time, and it 23 has only been in recent years that a growing number of lawyers, judges, and legal academics have begun applying classical rhetorical principles to the analysis of legal discourse (Frost 14). However, while legal theorists are deeply interested in interpretation theory, to my knowledge the interpretive stases have neither survived nor been resurrected as part of any modern theory of statutory interpretation or courtroom strategy for argumentation. Certainly, particular words and phrases, like letter versus spirit, persist, but they only vaguely index the same conceptual system of interpretive disputes that can be traced back to the ancient Greco-Roman tradition. So the question remains: how might this now dormant theory be resurrected for modern use? In the following section I introduce and outline a viable version of the interpretive stases for modern purposes, along with its theoretical underpinnings. The model is further elaborated throughout the rest of the dissertation. Toward a Modern Version of the Interpretive Stases The Six Stases of Interpretation What follows is my proposed model of the interpretive stases, six in all. These six stases offer a reasonably grained slicing of disputes over textual meaning at their roots: from a single word to how a text is applied in novel ways or situations. The definitions I give are informed by a wide view of the treatment they receive in rhetorical treatises over the centuries adapted for modern analytical purposes. 1) Letter and spirit: disputes in which the exact verbal formulation of a text is construed as being opposed to the author?s likely intention or another source of meaning that animates the text 24 2) Conflicting passages: when two parts of a text are construed as apparently contradictory 3) Ambiguity: when the text is construed as evoking more than one possible meaning due to its form 4) Definition: when there is disagreement over the limits of a term, that term being found either in a text or determined by a text 5) Assimilation: when a text is applied to a situation apparently not envisioned by the author 6) Jurisdiction: when there is disagreement over who can interpret the text in dispute or whether a text is applicable in the situation in question Disagreement The interpretive stases, as part of stasis theory, depend on a principle of disagreement. These stases locate recurring points of conflict that arise as hermeneut- rhetors attempt to coordinate their interpretations of a text. Given this principle of disagreement, the interpretation of texts in these rhetorical situations can be viewed as a dialogic process. Furthermore, that dialogic process involves persuasion. The theory implies that participants act under the assumption of agreement, in regards to their interpretation of a text, until there is a dispute. These disputes, or public discrepancies in interpretation, become loci of interpretive and rhetorical energy. Stasis theory gives us a means of classifying those disputes. Usually, hermeneut-rhetors are not content to merely disagree. They attempt to resolve their disagreements, and often there are stakes that pressure them to do so (e.g. 25 the need adjudicate a court case). Many discussions of the system in the rhetorical tradition include a set of topics for each interpretive stasis. These topics identify specific persuasive strategies that rhetors can employ in each stasis to persuade other parties in the dispute that their interpretation is correct, to resolve interpretive discrepancies. Through this push and pull, hermeneut-rhetors may arrive at shared constructions of meaning, although success is not guaranteed. A Heuristic for Interpretive Arguments in General The interpretive stases classify arguments concerning texts, not mere claims about the meaning of texts. Claims about texts made in response to other claims or claims about texts that arguers justify (using strategies which in many instances were identified in the traditional treatises as topics) can be classified according to this scheme. But general statements about textual meaning without either of these conditions cannot be classified with the interpretive stases because they are not arguments, and therefore do not presuppose a point of disagreement, though they may certainly invite contention.30 That said, the interpretive stases can be used as a heuristic not just for obvious interpretive disputes, where two parties clearly mark themselves as having opposed positions, but for interpretive arguments where the oppositional parties are either implied, imagined, anticipated, or otherwise unobvious.31 Useful here is Bakhtin?s concept of ?the dialogic orientation of discourse,? in which all discourse is a response to what has already 30 For example, the situation of new texts can present an initial interpretive situation where arguers can make uncontested claims about textual meaning without justification. 31 Fahnestock and Secor argue similarly that all arguments, even when there is no obvious opposition, can be analyzed within the framework of the (rational) stases (?Toward a Modern Version of Stasis? 224). 26 been uttered or common opinion, and is itself directed toward a response (279-280).32 Many interpretive arguments have a similar relationship with other interpretive arguments: they are made in response to and/or in anticipation of previous and/or future interpretations. However, sometimes arguers may erase or refuse to acknowledge opposing interpretations. Such erasures or refusals are themselves rhetorical moves, and, according to the heuristic of the interpretive stases, fall under the stasis of jurisdiction. In each of the following six chapters, I examine one stasis in detail. I survey a sample of the particular topics of each stasis, giving examples of each, usually one longer example with shorter ones, to demonstrate how the stases can be employed analytically as well as explore the unique characteristics of each stasis. The examples will be taken from real discourse from a variety of contexts?e.g. religious, legal, political, literary? genres?e.g. sermons, pamphlets, essays, debates?and media?e.g. oral, written, televised, online?to demonstrate that the interpretive stases, a flexible and versatile apparatus, can be applied to any dispute over a text, broadly construed to include recordings of oral discourse, irrespective of context, genre, or medium. The interpretive stases were a part of a standard set of tools for rhetoricians for almost two millennia, and it is high time that they return to the modern rhetorician?s toolkit. 32 More recently, Clark considers all language use joint action between participants, closely matching Bakhtin?s concept of language?s dialogism. 27 Chapter 2: Letter versus Spirit In early 2008, Barack Obama was in a heated contest with Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination for U.S. president. A junior Illinois senator, Obama?s rise to household name status was nothing short of spectacular. With his noted eloquence and campaign slogans, ?Change is now? and ?Yes we can,? he energized a growing number of voters, who had become disillusioned with President George W. Bush and saw in Obama the promise of a new era of governance. Obama also came to embody the possibility of a post-racial society. He was the son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya, and he self-identified as African American. Many hoped that his election to the oval office would signal a new and hopeful chapter in America?s bloody and tortured racial history. But in March of that same year a series of short videos were released that threatened to destroy Obama?s post-racial identity. That month ABC News showed video excerpts of sermons preached by Obama?s then pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright of Trinity United Church of Christ. These sound bites painted Wright as a radical, anti- American, black separatist, and by association cast doubt on Obama?s own patriotism and his ability to lead a multi-racial society. One sound bite, from a sermon Wright had preached in April 2003, was particularly controversial because in it Wright appears to be asking God to damn America: The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law, and then wants us to sing God bless America? No, no, no. Not God bless America. God damn America! That's in the Bible for killing innocent people. God 28 damn America for treating her citizens as less than human! God damn America as long as she [?] tries to act like she is God and she is supreme! (Wright)33 This sound bite, which lasted about thirty seconds, along with excerpts from other sermons Wright had preached, was played and re-played on major media outlets for weeks, posted on blogs, and viewed on YouTube. As it was circulated, it became the center of a heated interpretive dispute with potentially disastrous consequences for Obama?s candidacy.34 Critics claimed that the clip was an example of ?racial warfare? (Lopez), an ?anti- American attitude? (Sowell), and ?reverse racism? (Feldhahn). Others, however, defended Wright, arguing that his words were taken out of context, and that they were not anti-American, but an expression of deeply-felt sentiments shared by many African Americans in the United States, born out of their experience as a marginalized group in American society.35 Strikingly, Wright?s critics generally pointed to the exact wording of the sound bite as a clear indication of Wright?s racialist and anti-American beliefs, while Wright?s defenders generally went beyond the words of the sound bite in order to argue that his intentions were grossly misunderstood. Though they were unconscious of it, Wright?s 33 Transcription presented here adapted from the transcript provided of the sermon excerpt on the Bill Moyers Journal website. In the original broadcasted clip, the last sentence is faded out and the last dozen words cannot be heard (?Is Obama?s Pastor a Liability??). 34 Obama denounced Wright?s controversial statements and claimed he had not personally been in attendance when Wright had made the comments in question (Powell). Obama and his family revoked their membership from Trinity United Church of Christ and Wright was removed from Obama?s spiritual advisory committee (Johnson). It seems that critical interpretations of this sound clip (and others) were so pernicious to his campaign that Obama decided to sever all public ties with Wright rather than continue to provide his own defenses of them or his relationship with Wright. 35 For example, Buchanan; Kamiya; and Norman. 29 critics and defenders were arguing in the interpretive stasis of letter versus spirit: critics argued for an interpretation based on the letter of the sound bite, while defenders supported an interpretation oriented to the sound bite?s spirit. What exactly marks a dispute in the stasis of letter versus spirit? What differentiates an argument for letter versus an argument for spirit? How can the meaning of a single text be divided in such oppositional ways? And finally, how do disputants try to persuade each other to cross this interpretive divide? The Rhetorical History of Letter versus Spirit A division between the wording of the text and other appeals to textual meaning has a long history in the Western rhetorical tradition. Although his rhetoric predates the systematization of stasis theory, Aristotle?s thoughts on the subject, nonetheless, represent an early and influential view: ?And [it is also fair] to look not to the law but to the legislator and not to the word (?????) but to the intent (????????) of the legislator?? (1.13.17). Aristotle argues that fair jurors should consider the mind of the law?s author, rather than strictly follow what?s written. In separating what is written from what the author intended, Aristotle suggests that the words of a text may not necessarily reflect the intentions of the author, thus creating a potentially antithetical relationship between what the author has written and what the author meant. Once stasis theory had been given a more systematic frame, the split was given a more theoretical articulation without valuing one term over the other and was broadened to include written texts in general. As Cicero writes, ?A controversy over the letter and the intent (scripto et sententia) occurs when one party follows the exact words (verbis 30 ipsis) that are written, and the other directs his whole pleading to what he says the writer meant (sensisse)? (De Inventione 2.42.121). Cicero?s definition is fairly representative of how this stasis was viewed throughout the legacy of the stasis system for the next sixteen hundred years. Importantly, the constructed nature of this split was not lost on the ancients or their successors. The anonymous author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium observes for example that, ?A controversy from Letter and Spirit (scripto et sententia) arises when the framer?s intention appears (videtur) to be at variance with the letter of the text?? ([Cicero] 1.11.19; emphasis mine). An awareness of the constructed nature of the antithesis between the written formulation of a text and authorial intention also persisted through the centuries. However, there is an important distinction to be noted between later formulations of this antithesis, letter versus spirit, which is the antithesis used in the system outlined in this dissertation, and the antitheses found in earlier rhetorical tradition. That distinction is found primarily in the second term of the antithesis, which in the present system denotes not simply authorial intent, as is the case in many of the traditional rhetorical treatises, but any source of meaning not grounded in the text itself. Indeed, the opposition between letter and spirit is not original to the Greco- Roman stasis system and cannot be found therein. Instead we find, for example, ????? versus ??????? in Aristotle?s rhetoric, scriptus et sententia in the Rhetorica ad Herennium and Cicero?s De Inventione, scriptus et voluntas in Quintilian?s Institutio oratoria, and ????? ??? ??????? in Hermoegenes? On Issues. The antitheses expressed by these writers and found throughout the tradition is probably best translated as word or written text and intent. 31 The first known instance of the slightly different antithesis letter versus spirit in Western culture is found in one of the biblical letters of Paul of Tarsus, the apostle of Jesus.36 [Y]ou show that you are a letter of Christ, prepared by us [Paul and his spiritual son Timothy], written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything is coming from us; our competence is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of letter (?????????) but of spirit (?????????); for the letter (??????) kills, but the Spirit (??????) gives life. (2 Corinthians 3:3-6; emphasis mine)37 Paul constructs an antithesis between the written law that was a central part of Jewish religious tradition and the ?new covenant? of Christ that is given to Christians by the Holy Spirit.38 As he does not expressly advocate a particular hermeneutic for approaching the Scriptures here, it remains unclear whether Paul was reformulating the rhetorical antithesis of written word and intent, with which he may have been familiar.39 36 For more information see Cohen, ?Letter and Spirit in Jewish and Roman Law,? and Cohen, ?Note on Letter and Spirit in the New Testament.? 37 All English quotations from the Bible are taken from The New Oxford Annotated Bible. The Greek is taken from The Greek New Testament. 38 Cf. Romans 7:6 ?But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit (?????????) and not in the oldness of the letter (?????????).? 39 Boaz Cohen argues that Paul dressed the Greek rhetorical antithesis of word and intent (????? ??? ???????) in Jewish terms to create his antithesis letter and spirit (?????? ??? ??????) (?Letter and Spirit in Jewish and Roman Law? 115-116). 32 While the line between Paul?s invention and antecedent stasis theory remains uncertain, we might expect Paul?s influence on conceptions of this stasis to be more traceable, especially since the antithesis letter versus spirit seems to have more cultural currency than word versus intent does today. One potential point of consolidation between Pauline thought and Greco-Roman rhetorical theory may have occurred in the work of Augustine of Hippo, who in the fourth and fifth centuries AD worked to incorporate classical rhetoric into early Christian hermeneutics and homiletics. Augustine in fact devoted an entire book to Paul?s antithesis: The Spirit and the Letter (De Spiritu et Littera). Augustine takes Paul?s words and extrapolates from them a hermeneutic for interpreting figurative language in the Bible: ?That text??The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life??is naturally taken to mean that we are not to understand the figurative sayings of Scripture in their literal sense, which may be irrational, but to look for their deeper significance, and find nourishment for the inward man in a spiritual understanding of them?? (The Spirit and the Letter 6.4). Augustine goes on to demonstrate and apply this hermeneutic throughout the rest of the book, and indeed it represents his hermeneutic of choice in his other works. While Augustine?s work represents a further development of the antithesis letter versus spirit as a hermeneutic concept, it does not represent an incorporation of Paul?s antithesis into the stasis system. In De doctrina christiana, the work scholars generally hold up as Augustine?s major contribution to the rhetorical tradition, no coherent system of the interpretive stases or stasis theory in general exists. Reference to his separate 33 treatise The Spirit and the Letter is made, and we see this hermeneutic at work in the text, but we do not find the integration of Pauline thought and stasis theory here.40 Indeed, the antitheses naming this stasis found in the Latin rhetorical treatises that follow Augustine over the next eleven hundred years retain the terms found in the classical texts. After that time, stasis theory, and the interpretive stases in particular, begin to disappear from treatments of rhetoric. Thus, translations or readings of the Greek and Latin rhetorical texts that render the name of this stasis ?letter versus spirit? are anachronistic, insofar as they enlarge the second term of the antitheses to suggest something beyond what the original languages generally denote as ?authorial intent.? At the same time, rhetoricians in the tradition did not define the stasis as narrowly as the terminology word versus intent would suggest and there were even some variations. From what we know of Hermagoras? system, the homologous proto-stasis, a question in Hermagoras? system, was named word and exception (???? ????? ??? ???????????) (Nadeau, ?Classical Systems of Stases? 60). Hermagoras? formulation suggests that the interpreter may either choose to follow the text or make an exception for any number of reasons. We find this conceptualization of the stasis echoed in Gaius Julius Victor?s late antique rhetoric, when he writes that the rhetor in favor of intent ?interprets the meaning or takes an exception (excipit) to some one thing? (3.14).41 Victor goes on to enumerate intent in three ways: 40 This is not to say that Augustine was not influenced by stasis theory or the interpretive stases and that we cannot find evidence of such influence in DDC. Augustine knew Cicero?s rhetorical works, including De Inventione, quite well. It appears that the rhetorical tradition?s hermeneutics may have influenced Augustine, but this influence may have only worked in one direction. Subsequent rhetorical treatises do not pick up on Augustine?s terminology a la Paul or thought but continue with previous opposition. 41 The English translation is taken from Ostler?s text, while the Latin is taken from Halm. 34 Now we interpret the [intent]42 (sententiam) of the written law itself in three ways: if it is plain by itself that it cannot always be observed?or when examples are drawn from other laws by which it is proven that laws cannot always be observed; or when from the very words of the law we prove that the lawmaker did not intend (voluisse) literally that which the law states? (3.14) Here we see that Victor does not limit intent to authorial intent. Rather, intent is a kind of interpretation that takes into account the congruity between the written law and the particulars of the situation in question. A slightly narrower but still not exclusive view of intent appears in Hermogenes? 2nd century AD On Issues. While Hermogenes defines intent (???????) as that of the legislator?s in his introductory synopsis of the stases (2.14), in the section specifically dedicated to the stasis of word and intent, he expands the concept of intent to include not only the legislator?s intent but also the defendant?s intent in the situation being adjudicated (9.54-55). This expansion mirrors Aristotle?s advice to jurors regarding fairness: ?And [it is also fair] to look not to the law but to the legislator and not to the word (?????) but to the intent (????????) of the legislator and not to the action but to the deliberate purpose (??????????)?? (1.13.17; emphasis mine). For both Aristotle and Hermogenes, a juror may take into account both the legislator?s and the defendant?s intent in interpreting and applying the law. While expansions of the term intent exist in the rhetorical tradition, they are still too limiting for modern analytical purposes. This fact does not necessitate a wholesale 42 Ostler translates the Latin word sententiam as ?spirit,? but, as I argue, such a translation is anachronistic. The word ?intent,? which I insert instead, is much more accurate. 35 rejection of previous rhetorical theory in regards to this stasis. To the contrary, previous tradition was especially attuned to the many strategies used by disputants in this stasis, and knowledge of these is a crucial aid for the modern rhetorician. But for a more complete and deeper theoretical understanding of this long-standing category of interpretive of disputes, we can to turn to the insights of more recent theories in the fields of linguistics and rhetoric. From Letter versus Intent to Letter versus Spirit: A Modern Rhetorical Understanding In essence, interpretive disputes in the stasis of what we will going forward call letter versus spirit are those disputes in which the primary means of constructing the meaning of a text are divided in a mutually exclusive way. The first basic way involves the letter of the text, which all parties to the dispute agree is the apparent meaning of the text. The second basic way involves the spirit of the text, which goes against the apparent meaning. The letter of a text is in part derived from a text?s signifiers?its words, phrases, sentences, punctuation, etc.?while the spirit of a text is derived from ?facts relevant to making sense? of the text that fall outside of this linguistically encoded information (Bach 74). This split closely mirrors the contemporary linguistic division between semantics and pragmatics. However, a strict equivalence here is too facile as what constitutes the letter of a text versus its spirit is grounded in agreement among disputants. The letter of a text consists of a text?s semantics plus any pragmatic information that disputants take for 36 granted in constructing the apparent meaning of the text.43 The spirit of a text is derived from pragmatic clues (including clues from surrounding or other texts), but these clues, rather than being taken for granted, are visible to participants and in dispute. One could say that letter versus spirit debates parallel the semantic/pragmatic divide with an important distinction?in the former a certain amount of assumed pragmatic information is joined with the text?s semantics. Regarding this divide between the letter and spirit, rhetoricians and linguists alike might consider: When is certain pragmatic information assumed in the construction of a text?s apparent meaning and when is it considered a means of construing other meanings of a text that go beyond this obvious meaning? Is there any consistency in what kind of pragmatic information is generally assumed on the side of the letter? What factors determine on which side of the divide certain pragmatic information falls? How do arguers move pragmatic information from one side of this divide to the other? In response to this last question, one way arguers can move pragmatic information from the side of letter to the side of spirit is to highlight it, to bring it from the background to the foreground. Once a piece of pragmatic information has been brought to the surface, any interpretation derived from it in the context of a letter/spirit split falls on the side of spirit. Less clear is how to argumentatively background pragmatic information, moving it from the side of spirit to the side of letter. 43 My discussion of letter as a combination of semantics and taken for granted or ?background? pragmatic information on the part of disputants is based on Searle?s argument that ?the notion of the literal meaning of a sentence only has application relative to a set of contextual or background assumptions? (Expression and Meaning 117, 117-136). 37 While opposing interpretations are not at all unusual, letter versus spirit disputes involve opposing interpretations derived from different sets of clues. All parties agree on the ?apparent? meaning of the text.44 If they do not agree on this point, then the dispute moves to either the stasis of ambiguity or definition.45 But disputants in favor of letter argue that the text?s ?apparent? meaning is final, the text?s only meaning. For these disputants, their sufficient evidence for the text?s meaning rests in the text?s semantic, or linguistically encoded clues, with non-assumed pragmatic information playing a confirmatory role only. Disputants in favor of spirit argue that the text?s ?apparent? meaning negates the true meaning of the text and that this true meaning is best discovered in necessary and relevant evidence found outside of the text. These disputants interpret what they see as insufficient semantic information in light these other pragmatic clues. By valuing one set of clues over the other, both types of disputants dissociate the means of constructing textual meaning. I consciously employ the term dissociation according to its sense as presented in Chaim Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca?s work The New Rhetoric. According to Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, ?Dissociation?assumes the original unity of elements comprised within a single 44 As cognitive linguist Michael Israel puts it, the literal meaning or interpretation ?is always an idea about where meaning begins? (10). Or put another way, ?the ?literal meaning? of an expression is?its interpretation prior to re-interpretation? (Israel 7). The difference between defenders of letter and defenders of spirit is that the former takes the literal meaning as the final meaning, while the latter does not. 45 Such a disagreement can be a result of one of the parties refusing to accept the dissociation of semantic and pragmatic information. As with any dissociation, the invocation of a letter/spirit split can result in an opponent rejecting the perspective that permits such a dissociation (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 436). Also note that when a letter versus spirit dispute resolves to an issue of ambiguity or definition, it resolves to a ?lower-order? stasis. In other words, the dispute moves to one centered on the letter of the text, which serves as the basic point of agreement in a letter versus spirit dispute. See Chapter 8 for a more detailed discussion of the hierarchical relationship of the interpretive stases. 38 conception and designated by a single notion. The dissociation of notions brings about a more or less profound change in the conceptual data that are used as the basis of argument? (411-412). Furthermore, dissociation always involves a valuation of one concept, term, notion, etc., over the other (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 417). They label the less valued concept, that which represents the ?apparent, the ?actual,? the ?immediate,? ?what is known directly,? as term I (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 416). The more valued concept, that which ?provides a criterion, a norm which allows us to distinguish those aspects of term I which are of value from those which are not,? is labeled term II (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 416). Terms I and II are represented visually like so: term I/term II (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 416). In the stasis of letter versus spirit, we obtain the following basic dissociations: interpretation/letter and letter/spirit (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 428). For our purposes, these dissociations represent the argumentative stances that disputants take up in this stasis. The dissociation interpretation/letter represents the stance of the disputant in favor of letter who privileges the text?s semantics over less grounded interpretations, while the dissociation letter/spirit represents the stance of the disputant in favor of spirit who privileges a pragmatic construal of the text?s meaning over the dead (a la Paul) letter. Observe that the two dissociations are not perfect reversals of one another. As terms change their relative value in relation to one another, they often undergo a change in terminology (Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca 427). As we see in these two dissociation pairs, letter remains the same, reflecting the uncontested nature of the text?s semantics in a letter versus spirit dispute. But in the position of term I, spirit changes to interpretation. In these cases, letter is the valued term and ?mere? interpretation is seen as a dubious 39 manipulation of the text in this approach to textual meaning. When in the position of term II, spirit becomes a criterion for evaluating the semantics of the text and for determining the text?s meaning. As such, it cannot be a loose collection of pragmatic clues, at least not persuasively, but must be organized around a central point. Traditionally, that point has been authorial intent, but other possible points include the original audience?s interpretation, or an overriding principle of textual construal or of the people or institutions that hold that text in esteem. After a dissociation has been effected between a text?s letter and spirit, further dissociations are possible on either side of the divide. These further dissociations can be framed within what Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca call fan-type dissociations in which term II undergoes subdivisions: term I/term II