Doxa and a critical rhetoric: Accounting for the rhetorical agent through prudence

This paper explores the tension between critical rhetoric's doxa and a modernistic episteme. Critical rhetoric's professed move away from an agent‐centered rhetoric in favor of rhetorical textuality recasts and de‐emphasizes the ethical dimensions associated with action. Ironically, however, this same move precipitates the re‐emergence of the agent in the form of the critic who acts as interpreter‐constructor of texts for society. As a remedy, I develop a revised conception of doxa positioned within a critical rhetoric, which is contrasted to episteme, and then advance a conception of prudence (practical wisdom) that uses doxa as its underpinnings. Finally, I argue that the actions of the agent may be accounted for through a prudential critique, thereby outlining ethical considerations within a critical rhetoric.

Key concepts:

• Critical rhetoric
• doxa
• episteme
• prudence