Abstract

James L. Kinneavy, who was until this year the Blumberg Centennial Profes sor of English at the University of Texas, has been one of the major influences on the development of composition for more than 25 years. His bestknown book, A Theory of Discourse, published in 1971, is credited by many in our field with promoting the revival of rhetoric in university English That book was followed in 1976 by Aims and Audiences in Writing and Writing-Basic Modes of Organization (Both written with John Cope and J.W. Campbell). Kinneavy's theory of discourse relies on his definition of discourse as any utterance having a beginning, middle and end, and a purpose. He explained his theory graphically by means of his well-known communications triangle. this interview, conducted in May 1996 in Austin, Texas, he offers some ways that the triangle can be used in teaching writing. He also uses the trianglewith its acknowledged debt to Jakobson-to generate his theory of the major aims of discourse. Using this taxonomy, Kinneavy attempts to explain the basic organizational pattern of each aim of discourse. But Kinneavy does not wish to be known solely or even principally as a taxonomer, for, as he says, taxonomy is only a part of theory, and he has extended much of his influence as a theorist and historian of rhetoric. His 1987 book, Greek Rhetorical Origins of Christian Faith, explains how the new testament idea of faith grew out of the use of the term pisteis by Isocrates and Aristotle. Kairos is another term frequently associated with Kinneavy because of his lucid explanation of the term in his work. Kinneavy is credited with demonstrating the moral aspect of kairos, establishing a link between it and justice by arguing that to be moral and just means to observe the proper measure in action and words. At the end of the interview, with typical Kinneavian modesty in response to a question about how he looks back on his career as a scholar and teacher, he concedes that In the discipline of rhetoric, tried to recognize the importance of history and the importance of theory and the importance of the empirical. Finally, with a touch of pride, he closes with this admission: I think one of the most important contributions gave to rhetoric as a discipline was as one of the people-Corbett comes to mind; a lot of other people come to mind-who gave rhetoric a respectable name as a scholarly discipline in English departments. Few, if any, of the many members of our profession whose minds have been touched by Kinneavy would disagree.