Abstract

Richard has, of course, been a part of the contemporary philosophical and rhetorical scene for some time now. As, in fact, someone whose views I oppose pointed out to me recently: Rorty has been around long enough now to be attacked by any number of people for his naive view of the nature of discussion, that is, the nature of rhetoric. This same person also subsequently informed me that even (blank) [a well-known literary and rhetorical theorist whom he judged a particularly keen thinker] has moved Rorty. Needless to say, this essay is not at all about Rorty's so-called naivete (although I shall return to my colleague in the conclusion), nor is it about moving beyond anyone. It is, instead, about the usefulness of both Rortian attitudes toward philosophy and a Rormian perspective on the history of Western theories of knowledge, in illuminating the exceptional position in which rhetoric finds itself today. It is an essay about joining or, perhaps, his having already joined us, rather than about passing him--joining him, as Michael Oakeshott would have it (and as, in fact, cited by in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, in a passage which appears later in this essay), not in a universitas, a group united by mutual interests but rather in a societas, persons whose paths through life have fallen together united by civility rather than a common goal (318). That I might illustrate that this is not only a sensible but also a profitable course of action, I will in the pages following first give a brief overview of Rorty's life and published works (at least as they bear upon the possibilities of Rorty-asrhetorician or, better still, Rorty-as-harbinger-of-rhetoric), then outline what I take to be the main thrust of his work (what some would call his activity as a historian of ideas), then relate this thrust to present-day philosophy (as sees it growing and changing in the light of our awareness of that history--a central Rortian point: it is the historical-philosophical frame which gives both clarity and coherence to any explanation of where, intellectually, we have been or might go), and--finally--speak to what I at least find to be Rorty's considerable and enduring importance to the contemporary rhetorical scene. In doing the above, I may well offer more detail than is really needed by some already well-versed in Rorty's work. If this is the case, I ask the indulgence of these readers--in order that I might have the opportunity to address, and attempt to persuade, those who lack such a familiarity. First, life and works.