Articulate:

Definition: (noun) Having or showing the ability to speak fluently and coherently; having joints or jointed segments; (verb) pronounce (something) clearly and distinctly; express (an idea or feeling) fluently and coherently; form a joint.

Origin: Mid-16th century: from Latin articulatus, past participle of articulare ‘divide into joints, utter distinctly’, from articulus ‘small connecting part.’

Elocution:

Definition: The skill of clear and expressive speech, especially of distinct pronunciation and articulation; a particular style of speaking.

Origin: Late Middle English (denoting oratorical or literary style): from Latin elocutio(n-), from eloqui ‘speak out’ (see eloquence).

Wait, the same dude who talked shit about Mary Astell?

LOL what the f

Lol is she throwing shade rn because this sentence reminds me of the shade de Pizan threw too

Women's rhetorical sphere and a space/place for knowledge/information exchange: women's conversations

Again, we see Astell's argument working as super confrontational and super empowering at the same time.

I think it's important to note that the words Astell is using are not unusual or incredibily difficult to understand -- they are, in fact, pretty conversational, and don't seem pretentious or alienating. She's working with her audience.

This is awesome. It's confrontational but also empowering -- definitely keeping her audience in mind.

Who?

This is more for the men in the audience than the women, no?

My mind immediately went to gossip and how the exchange/passing along of information/knowledge between women has been through this "proper rhetorical sphere" -- (private) conversations.

The way obscurity is used here versus how it's used by Locke is also very interesting and very, very gendered.

We can see how the importance of female-only/female-dominated spaces in Astell's life played a major role in how she envisioned female learning/education could/should look like.

Oooo this is a very clever way to educate women so that they can support themselves. To serve God -- duh. Of course.

I'm thinking this is also a nod at the time women had/didn't have because of the various duties they had to fulfill. Also maybe a nod at the fact that women would probably not really have a space/place in which they could extensively read. Yes?

It's funny how today this view of how Christians should behave with/in society would probably be labeled as socialist (or, at least, not conservative).

Once again, very clever.

And once again, we see how the importance of female-only/female-dominated spaces/places in Astell's life influenced her beliefs on female learning/education.

She definitely put this view to work for her and for women.

Aaaaaand here is where de Pizan would probably give her a high-five.

More seriously, Christine de Pizan did something very similar to what I think Astell has done. They both seem to take the philosophical arguments made by famous male philosophers that were used against them/their sex/gender and instead make those philosophical arguments work with and for them/their sex/gender. Astell also seems to do this with religion.

Censure vs. censor...

Express severe disapproval of vs. suppress what is deemed unacceptable....

She frequently uses one and not the other.

Meaning "little Madonna" or "small Madonna." What is fascinating about this reference is the history behind the Madonnelle street shrines (little Madonnas) in Rome/other Italian cities. These little Madonnas were seen as the protectors of the communities in which they looked over (literally believed to be protecting them from evil). Also, lamps in front of the shrines were lit at night to guide passer-bys through the darkness, and, unlike other Madonna icons, these little Madonnas gazed directly at the viewer, establishing "a personal connection between the two." Maybe not such a ridicuous bluestocking figure to compare Mary Astell to afterall?

In my research on coffee talks with Bosnian/Bosniak women, there's a (recent) story I came across in which a family of four (mom, dad, daughter, son) who are part of the diaspora living in America are visited by grandma, who grew up and continues to live in Bosnia. Upon arrival, the grandma witnesses American coffee culture first-hand when her daughter, son-in-law, and grandkids gather around the kitchen table one morning and drink their coffee -- which was made by a machine -- quickly and quietly before running off to work or school. She is deeply horrified -- offended even -- so much so that she shortens her trip from one month to a week. In Bosnia, what kind of coffee you drink, how you make it, who you drink it with, when, and for how long, what you talk about while drinking it -- these are all very significant things. In America, not so much.

This is dope, and it makes me think of the ways in which spaces/places of worship are also spaces/places where acoustic performances happen (sermons, singing of religious songs).

This is similar to the ways in which spaces/places of worship are used today, too.

I've been writing and researching about the coffee talks that Bosnian/Bosniak women partake in and how our particular coffee came to be, how and when it affected/s our minds/bodies, and how it allowed for the emergence of a women-only space designed to foster the exchange of information+women's experiences and hold together entire communities. Coffee, for Bosnian/Balkan women, worked by stabalizing networks, and ultimately stabilizing Yugoslavia (you know, before the men and the West kinda fucked things up a bit). My research is ethnographic, and Rickert's argument here comes off a little bit like that.

This reminds me of Foucault's Self Writing.

Rhetoric, like the story of the carrier bag, like women's work...never finished, done, complete.

I don't know why this word in particular made me so upset, but like... dude, women are always holding shit. Handbags, babies, oats, always fucking something. And whatever that thing is that we're holding, it's almost always something that either a) sustains life, or b) is life.

I have to bring up James Cone and Albert Camus again -- but this time I'm reminded of Camus' The Rebel) and this paragraph from Cone's Black Power and Black Theology: "The crucial question, then, for the black man, is 'How should I respond to a world which defines me as a nonperson?' That he is a person is beyond question, not debatable. But when he attempts to relate as a person, the world demands that he respond as a thing. In this existential absurdity, what should he do? Should he respond as he knows himself to be, or as the world defines him?" Rebellion is what Cone, Camus, and Le Guin decide to do when they redefine what it means to be a person, to be human.

Chicken soup for the self-writer's soul? Jk.

Yet another thing words can do: heal.

A performance

So, we, too, are exercising ourselves through these readings and annotations -- we are corresponding and collaborating.

Words, doing their thing: doing.

The practice of self must include help of/from others.

Collaboration with(in) oneself?

They're traps!

It would also be more dangerous to say we know what rhetoric is -- to define it as one thing.

I think that hesitation as a response itself to the question "what is rhetoric?" can indicate that the person being asked understands the consequences and complexities surrounding the question and its answer.

"If people were more aware of x, then they would realize they're wrong about y, and they would do z" is a line that is constantly repeated in my WGST classes, and I always look like an asshole when I argue that that's not how things work.

Jenga!!

This is the politics of ignorance at play. If you acknowledge that there is a problem, you must then address that problem. You must do something about that problem. If you don't want to do something, then you will choose not to acknowledge that there is a problem.

This reminds me of Albert Camus' thoughts on absurdity, and what James Cone says in his book Black Theology and Black Power: "All aspects of this society have participated in the act of enslaving blacks, extinguishing Indians, and annihilating all who question white society's right to decide who is human....Absurdity arises as the black man seeks to understand his place in the white world. The black man does not view himself as absurd; he views himself as human. But as he meets the white world and its values, he is confronted with an almighty No and is defined as a thing. This produces the absurdity."

How convenient: a male-dominated, -controlled, -constructed, and -celebrated space is the space in which he is able to do and experience all of this. Too bad that this is also where he peaks.

The image of Lady Justice popped into my head as I was reading this, and I was particularly thinking about her blindfold and how it's meant to represent impartiality, the philosphical ideal that "justice should be applied "without regard to wealth, power, or other status." Upon looking at her Wikipedia page, I discovered that Lady Justice did not originally wear a blindfold because her "maidenly form" guaranteed her impartiality. If we're "toggling" between rhetoric and philosophy here, then it must also be argued that we're "toggling" between the feminine and the masculine. And If sex/gender was once what qualified someone to be impartial, how does this complicate the idea of virtue/training someone to be virtuous? How does it complicate our understanding of what the humanities do/can do? How does it help us work at/through what/who was/is/could be considered human?

Well, it can and it can't, right?

And if you try to, you're probably a fucking monster.

This reminds me of an article I read in my Feminist Epistemologies class, "The Egg and the Sperm: How Science Has Constructed a Romance Based on Stereotypical Male-Female Roles," which shook me to my core. It argues that science and culture are intertwined and that they influence and reinforce one another. The scientific descriptions of egg, sperm, reproduction, and ovulation she provides to support her argument show how dangerous the perpetuation of the idea of "value-free" and/or unbiased language can be (and is).

Underneath the Jenga blocks....

If such an event did occur, would we even be able to handle it as humans, as we are now? Do we fear that this would too explicitly showcase the complexities we try so hard to ignore, as well as our own limitations?

Because the theologian is reading it "as a good humanist would read a classic pagen text." Obvi.

Very important to ask who decided this and why.

I read this as: Reason = primary = (hu)man/masculine Rhetoric = other = woman/feminine

To be a woman is to be other. To be other is to be an abomination and, therefore, not human.

You also make them boring.

And yet, any mapping of humanistic inquiry onto a scientific model would lead to the creation of incomplete maps, of certain lies. One of those lies? If you can't use the scientific method to come to know something, then that something isn't knowledge/true/truth/fact.

To read it is also to learn how/why we have been lied to and how/why we will continue to lie to ourselves and others.

~ shout out to my homie Nietzsche ~

And not enough of other truths.

There is danger afoot.

I remember when I used to think that achieving equality under the law was like playing Jenga. Legal precedents were things that were stacked--one on top of another--like a tower of Jenga blocks, intricately connected. To fight for equality was to strategically go after specific precedents (blocks) that would eventually cause the tower to fall and allow for new, pro-equality precedents to be made (stacked), creating a new tower. But then I realized that Jenga can't be played if the initial blocks aren't placed on top of something else -- a particular surface/foundation -- and the same goes for legal precedents. There's always something lurking below (or beyond). We are still prejudging when it comes to the law -- but not in a way that works with or for everyone.