On Thinking Rhetorically

From "The Researcher as Missionary: Problems with Rhetoric and Reform in the Disciplines" by Judy Segal, Anthony Paré, Doug Brent and Douglas Vipond, College Composition and Communication, Vol. 50, No. 1 (Sep., 1998), pp. 71-90.

Part of our ideology as rhetoricians-and part of the rhetoric of our rhetoric-is the assumption that language ought to be treated as opaque: something to look at. We pay attention to language qua language in order to amass information on how it works in context. 

Our stance proceeds from the assumption that discourse practices are more easily influenced and changed when one understands them, and that the rhetorically aware practitioner is less locked in to modes of thought and action than one whose rhetorical knowledge remains tacit. 

While it may be possible to ignore one's ways of knowing-including one's ways of reading, writing, speaking, and listening-we believe it is important to think metarhetorically, for reasons other than the baldly practical one of getting things done. Knowing about knowing is prerequisite not only to change but also, simply, to choice.