CSS 3302: Rhetorical Theory, Argumentation, and Public Discourse

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering Toulmin's argument model, argument spheres, narrative theory, Habermasian and Fraserian public spheres, digital rhetoric, visual rhetoric, and the six tenets of public memory.

Argument 1

Argument conceptualized as a "thing"—a discrete speech act where an individual presents claims and supporting evidence.

Argument 2

Argument conceptualized as an "interaction"—the communicative process of reaching decisions and how people interact with Argument 1.

Claim

A statement that is open to question, establishes a speaker's position, and functions as an unproven assertion.

Fact Claim

A claim that advances an empirically verifiable statement capable of being confirmed or refuted using objective evidence.

Definition Claim

A claim that identifies and argues how a particular concept, term, or practice should be defined or categorized.

Value Claim

A claim asserting that something is good or bad, right or wrong, moral or immoral, which cannot be verified through empirical evidence.

Policy Claim

A claim that asserts what should or should not be done, serving as a directive call to action.

Data (Evidence)

Reasons, facts, or evidence provided to support a claim (appealing to logos); without it, a statement is merely an assertion.

Warrant

The underlying general assumption or mental leap that connects data to a claim, which typically remains unstated by the speaker.

Toulmin Model

A structural model of argument consisting of six functional elements: data/grounds, claim, warrant, backing, qualifier, and rebuttal.

Backing

Additional reasons, evidence, or credentials that support and validate a warrant by explaining why the underlying rule should be trusted.

Qualifier

Statements or terms (such as "always," "typically," "likely," or "possibly") that modify and limit the scope or certainty of a claim based on the strength of the warrant.

Rebuttal

A component of an argument that provides exceptions, acknowledges opposing viewpoints, or outlines conditions under which the claim may not hold true.

Argument Fields

Disciplinary or contextual frameworks where standards for what counts as legitimate data, warrants, and reasoning vary (RCL p. 117).

Spheres of Argument (Goodnight)

Three broad branches of social activity—personal, technical, and public—where the persuasiveness of an argument depends on the purpose and the specific audience.

Personal Sphere

An argument sphere characterized by informal interactions, minimal formal preparation, and private, everyday topics.

Technical Sphere

An argument sphere governed by strict, explicit conventions, specialized academic or professional knowledge, and expert judgments.

Public Sphere (Spheres of Argument)

An argument sphere that handles broader communal disagreements, civic issues, and matters of collective concern beyond the personal and technical spheres.

Narrative

A representation of at least two real or fictive events in a time sequence, neither of which entails the other (RCL p. 131).

Personal Memory

How individuals themselves recall and recount their own personal pasts through retrospective storytelling.

Post hoc, ergo propter hoc

A causal inference principle or fallacy where sequential occurrence leads an audience to infer that the earlier event caused the later event.

Vivacity

A sense of immediacy or presence created through the use of descriptions, imagery, and colorful language that make an idea come alive (RCL p. 139).

Myth

A narrative type that organizes everyday experiences, imparts cultural lessons, and structures how people understand themselves and others.

Narrative Probability

A standard for judging a narrative based on whether the story is internally coherent, free of plot holes, and realistic enough that the events could happen.

Narrative Fidelity

A standard for judging a narrative based on whether the story "rings true" with the lived experiences and previously accepted stories of the audience.

Plot

The aesthetic chain of causation connecting events within a narrative.

Character Development

An aesthetic narrative dimension evaluated by whether figures within a story conform to or violate expected human behaviors.

Authorial Intent

The assessment of whether a storyteller intends to present factual historical occurrences and determining the narrative's factual purpose.

Social Truth

Beliefs, values, and cultural understandings reached collectively by a community rather than grounded in strict empirical facts.

Comic Frame

A narrative viewpoint that treats others as mistaken rather than fundamentally evil, focusing on humanity, self-reflexivity, and constructive correction.

Tragic Frame

A narrative viewpoint that portrays opposing parties as vicious and evil rather than mistaken, focusing on defeat, power, and correction through force.

Public

A collective of people coming together to deliberate on common concerns, construct social reality, and determine identity and courses of action.

Public Sphere (Habermas, 1989)

An idealized domain of social life where private individuals assemble to form public opinion, characterized by universal access, deliberation on general interests, and freedom from coercion.

Weak Publics

Publics oriented toward opinion and identity formation rather than formal decision-making, which generate political influence primarily through consensus.

Strong Publics

Publics invested with institutional power that engage in both public opinion formation and binding decision-making (e.g., government bodies).

Hybrid Publics

Publics that refuse to separate civic identity formation from political deliberation, treating both processes as mutually reinforcing.

Counterpublics (Nancy Fraser, 1990)

Parallel discursive arenas where subordinated groups invent and circulate counter-discourses to formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests, and needs.

Enclaved Publics

Counterpublics that conceal anti-establishment ideas and strategies from wider society to avoid sanctions while fostering vibrant internal debate.

Oscillating Publics

Counterpublics that actively engage outsiders in public debate to test arguments, gain visibility, and influence dominant, stronger publics.

Networked Publics

Interconnected publics and counterpublics enabled and restructured by digital technologies where members can simultaneously produce and consume discourse.

Public Screen

A supplement to the traditional public sphere consisting of symbolic visual actions (e.g., image events, memes, and viral clips) circulating through broadcast and digital media.

Slacktivism

Low-effort digital political engagement that primarily serves to provide personal emotional satisfaction rather than generate structural or tangible change.

Echo Chambers

Online environments where algorithmic feeds and self-selection isolate participants from dissenting perspectives, reinforcing pre-existing views.

Visual Culture

A culture distinguished by the ubiquity of visual forms of communication that appear in multiple media outlets at the same time.

Mediated Visuals

Visual rhetoric produced and distributed through media technologies, such as photographs, television broadcasts, social media posts, and magazines.

Non-mediated Visuals

Physical visual rhetoric encountered in tangible space without screen mediation, including monuments, memorials, architecture, and clothing choices.

Body Rhetoric

Rhetoric that foregrounds the physical human body as part of the symbolic act, often used by marginalized groups lacking institutional access (RCL p. 77).

Iconic Photographs

Images that are universally recognized within a public culture, signify historically momentous events, elicit strong identification, and are widely reproduced and adapted.

Image Events

Staged, visually compelling acts designed specifically for media dissemination to reorient discourse and challenge dominant cultural norms (RCL p. 88).

Public Memory

A shared, collective sense of the past constructed by groups to articulate common origin, ideologies, and civic values with direct political implications.

Presentism in Public Memory

The tenet that collective memory is continually summoned, shaped, and activated by contemporary concerns, issues, or anxieties.

Communal Belonging in Public Memory

The tenet that collective memory constructs shared identities and establishes a sense of communal belonging by narrating who a group is.

Affect in Public Memory

The tenet that public memory is animated by emotional energy and communal judgments regarding who or what is worthy of remembrance.

Partisan Nature of Public Memory

The tenet that public memory is inherently partial, politically motivated, and constantly subject to social contestation and revision.

Material and Symbolic Supports

The physical artifacts, public monuments, historical sites, and cultural rituals that give public memory concrete form and durability.

Historical Evolution of Memory

The tenet that the practices, technologies, and institutional methods used by humans to record and preserve collective memory themselves change over historical eras.