RHETORIC IN SOCIOLOGY

Transcription

1 RHETORIC IN SOCIOLOGY Sociological books do not consist of neutral sequences of arguments which can be exhaustively analysed in terms oflogic and the rules of scientific evidence-in fact what professional conventions require them to present as evidence often has quite other functions, such as affecting the nature of the reader's personal responses to some dispute in progress. These books are processes of personal arguing, incorporating the preferences and perspectives of their authors and impinging on those of their readers. This is not to be deplored but to be welcomed, for reasonable arguing about events in society requires us to acknowledge those of its elements which are personal, moral and political, and to develop public criteria for assessing them in appropriate terms. This book makes an original use of themes taken from the tradition of rhetorical argumentation, to show how sociologists argue in practice- as opposed to what sociological methodology would lead us to expect-and hence to contribute to the understanding of reasoned arguing in general. It briefly introduces the theory of rhetoric, which deals paradigmatically with the development, through social interaction, of reasonable opinions about human affairs. Then it explores what the author defines as textual uses of example, rhetorical induction and rhetorical deduction. Here it uncovers a characteristically sociological tension between relying on consensus with readers about that social conduct which can be expected and justified, and assaulting readers' preconceptions about what conduct is normal and acceptable- changing their modes of participating in social life. Ricca Edmondson is now doing research work at the Max Planck Institut ftir Bildungsforschung, West Berlin. She took her BA degree at the University of Lancaster and her D Phil at Oxford. She has taught at the Free University, Berlin, and the University of Maryland in Europe.

2 RHETORIC IN SOCIOLOGY Ricca Edmondson Foreword by Anthony Heath M

3 Ricca Edmondson 1984 Foreword Anthony Heath 1984 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1984 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission First published 1984 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD London and Basingstoke Companies and representatives throughout the world British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Edmondson, Ricca Rhetoric in sociology, I. Rhetoric I. Title 808 PN187 ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI /

4 For Markus and Tom

5 Contents Foreword by Anthony Heath Preface Acknowledgements Introduction The Rhetorical Tradition Rhetoric and Reasonable Discourse Rhetoric and Sociology Personal Aspects of Argumentation Rhetorical Figures in Arguing Rhetoric and the Reader 2 Qualitative Sociology and Arguing from Example Arguing and Explanatory Effectiveness Rhetorical Order and Value Judgements Examples and Typicality Actual Types and Rhetorical Induction Summary 3 'Scientific Social Theory' as Suasive Dialogue Influencing the Reader? Relationships with Active Readers Suasion and Experience in Arguing Readers' Interventions in Arguing Summary 4 Meaning, People and Rhetorical Induction Values and Rhetorical Meaning The 'Epitome' of the Affluent Worker Rhetorical Induction: A Guide to Expectations Summary IX XI Xlll l Vll

6 Vlll Contents 5 Rhetorical Deductions in Sociological Texts 110 'Ordinary Person' Enthymemes 112 Ordinary Person Enthymemes and Restructuring Opinions 120 The 'Reasonable Person' Enthymeme 126 Communicative Attitudes in Textual Argumentation 139 Summary Sociology, Rhetoric and Personal Communication 14 7 Conceptual Innovation and Personal Change 151 Appraising Sociological Texts 157 Appendix: The Choice of Books 167 Notes and References 170 Bibliography 1 79 Index 187

7 Foreword Anthony Heath Rhetoric in Sociology is an original and important book which should change the way in which sociologists vi6w their own work. It is quite different from what we usually think of as the philosophy of social science, and seems to me all the better for being so. Like many sociologists I have always been somewhat impatient with the traditional philosophies of social science, which generally have rather little connection with sociology as it is actually practised. They tend to be largely prescriptive, telling sociologists what is to count as an acceptable explanation, but they do so from a position of almost total ignorance about the current content of sociological writing and research. If you consider two such contrasting philosophers as Winch and Nagel, you will find that they are none the less remarkably similar in their cursory reading and quotation of sociological texts. They refer mainly to the methodological writings of the founding fathers, and while I am an admirer, albeit a distant one, of Marx, Weber and Durkheim, I believe there was quite a gulfbetween what they practised and what they preached; and the contemporary practice of sociology has in any event moved on considerably since their day. Contemporary sociology is a serious intellectual activity in its own right and worthy of serious philosophical study. And this is what Dr Edmondson gives us. She begins by making the deceptively simple, but fundamental, shift from classical methodology to contemporary practice. She bases her enquiry on the work of leading current sociologists- Blau and Duncan, Goldthorpe, Dore, Rex and Moore, Willis and Goffman -selecting their works on the basis of peer-group evaluation. And she concentrates throughout on describing the explanatory strategems which they actually employ rather than on prescribing ex cathedra what they ought to be doing. IX

8 X Foreword This basic move leads Dr Edmondson to two discoveries. First, sociological arguments do not fit neatly into the formal canons of the philosophies of science or even the methodological prescriptions of Weber or Durkheim. The practice is rather different from the prescriptions, and although Dr Edmondson is too courteous to say it in so many words, so much the worse for the prescriptions. It seems to me that rules which people never follow, like laws which are more honoured in the breach than the observance, must inevitably fall into disrepute. Second, Dr Edmondson rediscovers rhetoric. The sociological texts which she examines prove to abound with rhetorical devices. They turn out to be exercises in communication and persuasion, addressed to specific audiences and taking account of the audience's presumed attitudes, expectations, and personal positions, and they employ a wide range of rhetorical strategies which are necessary to make the writer's view accessible to the reader. Sociological texts are thus not to be regarded as formal deductive structures but rather as quasi-forensic documents set within a specific social context. Again, Dr Edmondson argues that sociology is none the worse for this. True, rhetoric has long had a bad name in Western culture and has been regarded as a matter of stylistic embellishment which is at best merely decorative and at worst a dishonest attempt to manipulate the unsuspecting reader. But Dr Edmondson tries to rescue rhetoric from its bad reputation and return to an earlier tradition, Aristotelian in origin, which viewed it not as 'a technology of manipulation but an exploration of reasonable intersubjective communication in society'. In this sense, the techniques of rhetoric are used, indeed are essential, in order to enable the reader to grasp for himself or herself, to appreciate, the meaning of what is being said. Dr Edmondson's point is that the subject matter of sociology itself requires the use of such techniques. In the interpretive approach to sociological explanation, for example, it is not enough for the sociologist to understand the subject; the understanding must be communicated to the reader in such a way that he or she can perform essential parts of constructing the account which the author offers. And the reader's position as a member of a similar social world to those of the writer and the subject poses constraints and conditions on the form that that communication can take. Sociological explanation, therefore, cannot be divorced from sociological communication. They are inevitably linked together.

9 Foreword Xl The great interest of Rhetoric in Sociology is in Dr Edmondson's demonstration of how this communication is actually carried outof the explanatory-cum-communicative techniques which contemporary sociologists of all schools, not just the interpretive, use. The ideal type, for example, is a standard explanatory device in the sociologist's repertoire, much discussed by philosophers and methodologists, but Dr Edmondson shows that in practice sociologists make a great deal more use of related, but distinctly different, devices which she terms 'actual types' and 'epitomes'. In place of the formal deductive argument she shows that sociologists use the 'enthymeme', a method of 'reasonable inference' first described by Aristotle. Simultaneously she discusses the techniques of'rhetorical induction'. And in place of formal models of rational action sociologists make much more use of commonsense notions of 'the ordinary person' and 'the reasonable person'. What all these techniques have in common is that they depend on particular takenfor-granted assumptions about the way in which people behave, assumptions which must be shared by both reader and writer if the explanatory argument is to convince. It is for this reason that sociological explanation must be seen as a social activity, not as an exclusively logical or statistical one. Dr Edmondson's aim is not to reform the practice of sociology but to bring our preaching more into line with the practice. She would like to deflect us from ambitions to be natural scientists and to offer us a methodology which is more true to the nature of our own subject. She would, I am sure, like us to accept the epitome and enthymeme as legitimate and indeed essential tools of our trade. I find this a refreshing- and persuasive- change from our usual fare. Jesus College, Oxford

10 Preface I first came to sociology from philosophy, when I was confronted almost at once by two problems. First, I was unable to make much connection between sociological methodology and what seemed to me convincing and explanatory in sociological books. The aspects of sociological texts which struck me most seemed to have no counterparts in the theoretical accounts of what sociologists ought to do. Second, when I tried to write up some fieldwork of my own I found that I had accumulated a number of experiences which seemed to me important but which, according to these theoretical prescriptions, had no place in a sociological report. I became very puzzled about what it is that sociologists really do, and in order to find out I set to work to examine their actual practice as it is revealed in the texts they write. In order to describe this practice here I have used concepts taken from the tradition of rhetoric-where 'rhetoric' means the study and exercise of arguing in such a way as to make what one says plausible and accessible to one's hearer, to bring it home to him or her-ina manner which enhances the hearer's ability to make what one says an independent part of his or her own perceptions and decisions. Since this is a conception of rhetoric which differs from everyday, more pejorative uses of the term, I explain its origin and functions in the Introduction and Chapter l. The remainder of the book shows what difference rhetorical notions make to our conception of what sociological writing is, and to methodological prescriptions about it; not least prescriptions about textual evidence, objectivity and understanding. In the end two things have interested me most: the integral and legitimate place of rhetoric in understanding and reasoning about events in the social world, and the implications this has for the roles of feeling, personal reaction, and moral and political judgement in sociology. I should like to thank Alessandro Pizzorno for first suggesting that the textual phenomena I was talking about might be rhetorical Xlll

11 XIV Preface ones; and for their advice and support since that time I should like to thank Angela Cunningham, John H. Gold thorpe, Anthony Heath, Christel Hopf, Klaus Jacobi, Russell Keat, John and Aveen Maguire, Markus Worner, as well as my D Phil examiners, Kenneth MacDonald and Herminio Martins; and my editor, Anne-Lucie Norton. For making it much easier and pleasanter to combine writing a book with family life I should like to thank Anke Bauer, Eileen Edmondson and Barbara Otto. Any errors which this book may contain are almost certainly not the faults of the people mentioned above. I am relieved to be able to say that if my theories are correct, at least some of them may have been contributed by the reader. R. E.

12 Acknowledgements The quotations from john Rex and Robert Moore, Race, Community and Coriflict: A Study of Sparkbrook, Institute of Race Relations 1967, are reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press; those from Goldthorpe et al., the A.J!iuent Worker series, , by permission of Cambridge University Press. XV