CCR760 – Gurak – Just Notes

I’m not on blogging duties this week, so i’m just posting notes. Gurak – Persuasion and Privacy in Cyberspace Chapter One – Introduction:  Persuasion, Community, and Cyberspace This study deals with two online protests which “dealt with computers, privacy, and the shape of communication technology and society in the 21st century” (1) Self-selection of what to put onto the internet vs. your information being controlled by media... Read More

CCR711 – Habermas – Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere

If you’re looking for the Frankfurt School concept map from the Habermas presentation in class on Thursday 2/11, you’ll find it here. Outline of Habermas’ Argument: Thesis:  What are the social conditions for rational-critical debate about public issues by private people who let argumentation, not status, determine decisions? Social systems of “public” The Greek Model – freedom is found in the public; however, those who are... Read More

CRS862 – Week One – Habermas and Putnam

Bowling Alone:  America’s Declining Social Capital An Interview with Robert Putnam Robert Putnam Putnam’s main contention here is that in the post cold war era, civic engagement has given way to passive reliance on state and media apparatus. Historically, the US has been a model for self-federation and active, participatory democracy – this is enshrined in de Tocqueville’s work. Yet, this slide toward federation always comes at the expense... Read More

CCR601 – R&P 42.3

Bayer, Thora I. “Hegelian Rhetoric.” Philosophy and Rhetoric 42.3 (2009): 203-19. Print Rhetoric is an antistrophe to dialectic (antistrophe is the “turning back” of the chorous on the audience in the traditional ancient Greek play). Kant considered dialectic the “logic of illusion” that occurs when reason takes its powers beyond experience to make claims concerning the nature of the soul, world, and God (203). Kant is responsible... Read More