Why We Say it Like That: Making Rhetorical Practices Explicit for Students in Disciplinary and Interdisciplinary Courses

ABSTRACT

Students in colleges and universities need to be able to learn how to communicate effectively both within the specialized arenas of their chosen disciplines and, increasingly, with a wide variety of public and professional audiences. One way to accomplish this goal is to integrate the development of effective writing and speaking skills into both our disciplinary and interdisciplinary classrooms. In this essay, we suggest that faculty to adopt a “rhetorical perspective” in their teaching, regardless of discipline, in order to capitalize on already existing faculty expertise and empower students. Specifically, a rhetorical perspective integrating speaking and writing can help students to become more active agents in their intellectual development, can help faculty design assignments and activities that relate directly to course goals and learning outcomes, and can provide a framework for feedback that can facilitate student learning.

KEYWORDS:

• Rhetoric
• speaking
• speech
• teaching