The rhetorical value of reading aloud in Thomas Sheridan's theory of elocution

M. Wade Mahon University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point

Abstract

Abstract Although viewed as problematic and strange by many scholars, the elocutionary theories of Thomas Sheridan deserve more scholarly attention because of their unique understanding of the relationships between writing, oral reading, performance, and literary consumption. In contrast to Hugh Blair's emphasis on silent reading and tasteful (and passive) appreciation of literature, Sheridan concentrates on tasteful (and active) interpretation of literature through oral performance. Sheridan's theories complicate our understanding of eighteenth‐century rhetoric, its relationship to “literature,”; and its lasting effects on educational practices.

Journal
Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Published
2001-09-01
DOI
10.1080/02773940109391215
CompPile
Search in CompPile ↗
Open Access
Closed
Topics
Export

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (0)

No articles in this index cite this work.

References (37) · 1 in this index

  1. Lectures on the Art of Reading.
  2. British Education
  3. A Course of Lectures on Elocution: Together with Two Dissertations on Language; and Some …
  4. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism.
  5. 10.1080/03637756409375387
Show all 37 →
  1. The Dublin Orator
    Leeds Texts and Monographs
  2. Eighteenth‐Century British and American Rhetorics and Rhetoricians
  3. Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres
  4. Reading as Rhetorical Invention: Knowledge, Persuasion, and the Teaching of Research‐Base…
  5. “From Schoolroom to Stage: Reading Aloud and the Domestication of Victorian Theater.”
    Bucknell Review
  6. “The Fortunes of the Performative in Literary and Cultural Theory.”
    Literature and Psychology
  7. 10.1215/9780822398226-034
  8. 10.2307/378878
  9. Sparks of Fire: Blake in a New Age
  10. Rhetoric Society Quarterly
  11. Eighteenth‐Century British Logic and Rhetoric
  12. Samuel Johnson
  13. “Reading Aloud in Mansfield Park.”
    Nineteenth‐Century Literature
  14. 10.1017/CBO9780511582790
  15. “Jane Austen and the Power of the Spoken Word.”
    Persuasions
  16. 10.2307/j.ctt5hjs65
  17. 10.1080/00335636609382768
  18. 10.2307/1917398
  19. 10.2307/450822
  20. 10.1353/ajp.1997.0029
  21. Theory, Text, Context. Issues in Greek Rhetoric and Oratory
  22. 10.1353/elh.1996.0019
  23. The Beginnings of Rhetorical Theory in Classical Greece
  24. 10.1080/00335639209383978
  25. 10.1515/9781400876228
  26. A Discourse Being Introductory to his Course of Lectures on Elocution and the English Language
  27. Transactions of the Philological Society 1974
  28. 10.1016/0191-6599(87)90162-8
  29. “Isocrates’ Competing Conceptualization of Philosophy.”
    Philosophy and Rhetoric
  30. Things, Thoughts, Words, and Actions: The Problem of Language in Late Eighteenth‐Century …
  31. 10.1017/CBO9780511560880
  32. 10.2307/463244