Spring Scholarly Event: Robert Asen

KU Ars Rhetorica has collaborated to secure the funding to bring in super-scholar Dr. Robert Asen from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Come join as he will be doing several events:

• 7:00pm on Monday March 5th Dr. Asen will deliver a lecture titled "Notes on the Relationship Between Deliberation and Trust." His lecture will be in 100 Stauffer-Flint Hall.
• 1:00pm on Tuesday March 6th Dr. Asen will join the Rhetoric and Counterpublics class being co-taught by Frank Farmer (Dept. of English) and Dave Tell (Dept. of Communication Studies).
• 4:00pm on Tuesday March 6th Ars Rhetorica will be hosting a happy-hour meet-and-greet with Dr. Asen at The Bird Dog in The Oread. Come grab a drink and talk shop with Dr. Asen about anything and everything!

The full press release is posted here.

Beers, Rhetoric, and our Springtime Meeting!

Hello KU Rhetoricians!

Mark your calendars and join us on Thursday, February 23rd 2:30-3:30pm for our first meeting of the semester at the Oread restaurant (/Bird Dog Bar). We will be discussing Dr. Robert Asen's visit March 5-7th, our upcoming social, the 2013 Summer Institute, and other rhetorically-relevant topics!

We hope to see you then!

Rachel Bloom

KUAR Chair

Letter from the Chair: Exciting News

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to take a moment to write about exciting news that your KUAR exec team has been working hard behind the scenes to make happen. Tonight we officially received approval from Student Senate for funding to bring Dr. Rob Asen (UW-Madison) to visit and speak at KU this coming Spring! Dr. Asen is a well-known public sphere theorist and a full professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison. (Read more about him here: http://commarts.wisc.edu/directory/?person=rbasen) He will be visiting us for a few days and in that time he will visit Dr. Dave Tell & Dr. Frank Farmer's seminar on Counterpublics, do a meet and greet luncheon, and give a lecture on campus. With Dr. Mary Jo Reiff's "Engaging Publics" seminar finishing up next week and Dr. Tell & Dr. Farmer's seminar on "Counterpublics" next semester, we felt this would be a timely and exciting series of events to host for our organization and any student who might be interested on campus!

Beyond the good news that we've received initial funding for his visit, we also now have sparked interest in the members of Student Senate to learn more about KUAR and public sphere theory. We anticipate having both graduate students and undergraduates attend these events, so this will be a great way for us to make some new connections across disciplines with others interested in learning about some of our research.

With January being the 1 year anniversary of starting this organization, I'm happy to say we've already accomplished quite a bit in only one year. Looking forward to Dr. Asen's visit and our first co-taught COMS-ENGL seminar on Counterpublics are definitely two of many highlights I anticipate us seeing in the 2012 year.

As we finish up the semester, we wanted to get together one last time to celebrate everyone's hard work, so please join us for a gathering at Henry's upstairs this Friday, Dec. 2nd at 5:00pm to drink, mingle, and take a break before our final week of classes. I look forward to seeing everyone there and wish you the best of luck going into finals - whether you're writing papers, grading papers, or just trying to save paper, I hope the end of the semester treats you well.

All my best,
Rachel Bloom
KU Ars Rhetorica Chair

Dr. Jay Childers Colloquium

As many of you may our own Dr. Jay Childers is presenting this Wednesday for Colloquium. His lecture is titled “The Fitness of Patriotic, Productive Workers: Defining Citizenship after the McKinley Assassination.”

The presentation will be Wednesday (11/9) at Alderson Auditorium (in the Student Union) at 4pm.

There will also be some social time afterwards with drinks at 5pm at the Bird Dog Cafe (in the Oread). Come to both if you can!

Dr. Childers classes on Pop Culture and Agency have attracted scholars from both rhetorical departments and he will be teaching another class on Democratic Engagement in the spring. This is a great chance to get key insights into his passionate scholarly pursuit.

Hall Center Presents Dr. Dave Tell

Dr. Dave Tell who will be co-teaching a seminar this spring with Dr. Frank Farmer will be presenting a lecture titled "Capote in Kansas: The Making of a Region" at the Hall Center this Friday the 11th at 12:00pm.

If you want to go, you MUST RSVP to hallcenter@ku.edu. The website says the RSVP deadline has passed, but I am told this means they can't provide lunch for you if you RSVP this week but I think you can still come.

Ars Rhetorica Social

Ending a busy week there is an Ars Rhetorica social tonight at 730pm. We're bowling! ... @ Royal Crest Lanes. Come get your bowl and drink on.

Recap: Dr. David Zarefsky Ars Rhetorica Luncheon

The Ars Rhetorica luncheon with RSA President Dr. David Zarefsky of Northwestern Unviersity was a great success. He spoke about the contemporary state of rhetoric and opened up the floor for a Q&A. Dr. Zarefsky’s disciplinary wisdom shined through as he addressed where the discipline is heading, how to excel as a rhetoric graduate student, and even gave specific suggestions for our own RSA Student Chapter Ars Rhetorica.

Dr. Zarefsky held a sense of grounded optimism about the field of Rhetoric throughout his talk. "As humanities continues to take language seriously more and more disciplines have a growing interest in rhetoric,” said Zarefsky. While the job market for rhetoricians may be tight, unlike many areas of the humanities, Dr. Zarefsky believes that the area of rhetoric is expanding.

Commenting on rhetoric as a stabilized discipline Dr. Zarefsky repeatedly emphasized a discipline is pragmatically “created by the people that exist within it.” Thus, rhetoric is both stabilized and expanded based on the production of its scholars. This also means, added Dr. Zarefsky, that rhetoric growth evidences how “it has not allowed itself to be [methodologically] constricted by the university system.”

Practically he encouraged graduate students to dive deep within the “roots” of a focused trajectory. In this way students can get a concrete grasp on phenomena that can lead to an expanded audience of one's rhetorical findings - such as the audience a book provides.

Concerning Ars Rhetorica specifically he encouraged us to continue to “be as active and visible as you can.” “As you grow within KU,” said Dr. Zarefsky, “you’ll also grow in prestige nationally concerning other organizations like RSA.”

The talk was quite an optimistic, yet grounded, look at the rhetorical field. While we may have departmental overlap it is our generation's task to work together. So as KU Ars Rhetorica moves on, lets push to be more visible locally and nationally. Let’s actively participate in the discourse of rhetoric and stay tuned for the specific ways in which we can expand together.