Charles Arthur Willard. Liberalism and the Problem of Knowledge: A New Rhetoric for Modern Democracy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. x + 384 pages. Bernard Crick. In Defence of Politics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962. 156 pages. Jose Ortega y Gasset The Revolt of the Masses. New York: W. W. Norton, 1932 [1930]. 204 pages. John Dewey. The Public and Its Problems. Denver: Alan Swallow, 1927. 224 pages.

As I enter my last year of my editorship of the Quarterly, a sense of sadness is setting in, both about my declining energies and about the ending of my love affair with the Quarterly. But all good things just cannot go on forever. It is a little late now to be expressing some of the following sentiments, but still they might prove useful to some readers. As a statement of farewell my sentiments hopefully may place in perspective what the Quarterly has been all about. These rather unscholarly sentiments have guided my nickle and dime makeshift efforts to put together the Quarterly year after year. It is probably best that I have kept some of these sentiments to myself up until now, much like Harry Truman's final negative sentiments about the Missouri Waltz. But, let me out with them, for they say much about the form and shape the Quarterly has taken over the years. As comments they will be valedictory rather than advice for rhetoricians to come. I do not want to impose upon my successors the burden of my errors. I don't think that I need tell many members of the Rhetoric Society that around some academic colleagues to fly the flag of is to invite not only scorn but contempt. With some it is to put professional careers at hostage and to place the direction of our research and scholarship in the hands of people who are making judgments where of they know not what they judge. If we wish to develop and expand programs under the label of rhetoric, it has, at least been my experience, to have to engage in endless explanations to colleagues about what it is we are doing in the name of rhetoric, why it is important, and above all that it is academically respectable. Certainly our claims need defending, but to have to continuously defend tries patience. By now we should, one would think, as skilled rhetoricians have convinced our opposition in academia of our eminent respectability. But we have not. I recall how on one occasion, when I was asked to justify the inclusion of philosophy, not rhetoric, in the general education program in my school, that I impatiently challenged that the burden of proof was on any one who wanted to eliminate it. Similarly, if the burden of proof were to be shifted to our opposition, I suggest, maybe they would have to take the time to know a little more about what they discount. But alas, to try to advance professionally under the flag of rhetoric, despite our convictions of its importance, is to go against the reversals of history, the Ramus decay, and the eventual complete collapse of as an academic discipline in the 19th century. It is most of all to have to struggle against the present day pejorative use of the term rhetoric. The common usage of the term rhetoric defines us. Rhetoric is merely mere. It is the common expletive for saying that what you say says nothing. Still, despite these simplistic dismissals of rhetoric, I fly my flag of knowing that my judgment about its overwhelming value to human history is correct. But the image of flags waving does, I admit, give me pause, for I have in my associative memory another image of a flag, a flag that cautions me about loyalty to any dead cause. It is the image of the Confederate flag. Has my loyalty to been very much different in kind from that of the South's nostalgic loyalty to that lost cause of all lost causes the Southern Confederacy?

Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish Your Thesis, Book, or Article. Howard S. Becker with a chapter by Pamela Richards. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1986. pp. xii + 180. A War of Words: Chicano Protest in the 1960s and 1970s. John C. Hammerback, Richard J. Jensen and Jose Angel Gutierrez. Westport, Connecticut and London: Greenwood Press, 1985. Words and Values: Some Leading Words and Where They Lead Us. Peggy Rosenthal. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984; pp. i‐xii + 29S. Rhetorical Stances in Modern Literature: Allegories of Love and Death. Lynette Hunter. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1984.

To speak of and cynicism in the same breath is to bear a double burden of pejorative jeopardy. The pejorative freight of either term, rhetoric or weighs heavily against anyone who tries to use these terms in non-pejorative ways. Such people are quite simply trying to swim against a torrent of pejorative everyday usage. Yet some of the positive historical legacy of the traditions of classical and of the ancient cynics is still around and does carry over into contemporary contexts, especially when we speak of and cynicism away from the marketplace and in academia, where still is the art of persuasion and cynicism graces literary texts with clever displays of verbal play and repartee. Wayne Booth at a recent conference, in discussing the problem of the public image of rhetoric, quoted a colleague as referring to some fellow as asshole, but at the same time explaining that the term was not intended in its pejorative sense. The twist of irony in the remark stimulates our imagination to come up with a context in which someone could be an asshole in a nonpejorative sense. Quite possibly there is a virtue in acting like an asshole towards others who act the same. Let us leave aside any question of a non-pejorative sense of rhetoric. What possible approbation can there be for the cynic, or for the use of the role of the cynic in our rhetoric? What is the rhetorical payoff of a cynical ethos? What function do cynical remarks serve in rhetorical strategies? To pursue these questions I caution against question begging assumptions when we examine the phenomenon of cynicism, for cynicism is a loaded term. But first off, cynical remarks do not a cynic make. Yet certainly they are used as evidence for attributing cynical attitudes, beliefs and cynicism to the one who makes them. Note in your own experience the degree to which the attributions of cynic and cynical are simply allegations that a sin has been committed. A second note of caution. The phenomenon of cynicism is, I believe, recalcitrant to any essentialist description, and we ought to avoid the pitfalls of pursuing a phantom of cynicism, that is, seeking to describe or to define the essential nature of cynicism. If you are not willing to take my advice on this matter, I commit you to chasing your tail endlessly in verbal circles, a game called whose paradigm is on first?

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This chapter draws distinctions somewhat unorthodox in discussing terms such as and with respect to rhetorical action. It suggests that the rules and conventions of linguistics and speech act theory are inadequate for a complete account of rhetorical phenomena. The chapter argues that the rules, conventions, and constraints of rhetorical action differ from those operating in conversation or dialogue. It also argues that in view of the fact that rhetorical action and strategies are in large part determined by constraints generated by aim, media, audience, and situation, rhetorical action is in large part not constrained by rules and conventions that are universal to human action or the language used. The chapter examines the effect that although linguistic conventions and rules, including speech act theory, are incidental to defining the felicity of certain rhetorical genre and modes, the main thrust of the art of rhetoric and rhetorical strategy deals with constraints not grounded in conventions and rules.

Understanding Discourse: The Speech Act and Rhetorical Action, Karl R. Wallace. Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press, 1970. Ideology, by L. B Brown. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1973. 208 pp. $2.95. Ideology, by L. B Brown. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1973. 208 pp. $2.95.