Writing the body: An experiment in material rhetoric

Rhetoric Review Sep 2000

Writing the body: An experiment in material rhetoric

Cheryl Forbes Hobart and William Smith Colleges

Abstract

Rita Copeland, a medievalist, reminds us that rhetoric is a the real world, circumstance, shifting and fragmented experience; in other words, a the itself (Framing Medieval Bodies 155). It is this discourse the body that concerns me here, translating temporality, circumstance, shifting interests into the following: time, space, weight. These three are the terms I will pursue, focusing on the work Milan Kundera and the late Andre Dubus as examples. They bring the bodies their characters into existence using space, weight, and time; that is, they write the body-inscribe it, mold it, shape it, give it material presence-just as dancers do. I want to suggest a rhetorical theory of the body in terms space, weight, and time and then to demonstrate how that theory might fruitfully inform our interpretation texts-not only literary texts like those Kundera or Dubus but also non-literary texts, such as journals, diaries, letters.1 The terms I am using come from Rudolf Laban, who developed a complex system movement analysis, a part which is called Effort/Shape. He worked first with ballet in Central Europe and later studied motion among British factory workers during World War II (efficiency studies). Many moder dancers have adopted his insights about movement and talk about space, weight, and time as characteristics choreography and their own bodies. They judge a good dance by its use space, weight, and time (these aren't the only criteria, course); they train their bodies first to understand its idiosyncratic preferences for using space, weight, and time and second to understand their bodies in relation to these three.

Journal: Rhetoric Review
Published: 2000-09-01
DOI: 10.1080/07350190009359278
Open Access: Closed
Topics: body and rhetoric