Rhetoric and this crazy little "thing" called love

Eric S. Jenkins, Josue David Cisneros

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

This essay theorizes the relationship between rhetoric and love, and its consequence for theories of subjectivity. Past scholarship on love and rhetoric is critiqued for beginning with questions of ontology and for engaging in the dialectical gesture of judging love as true or false according to that ontology. This stance, which Ronald W. Greene calls moral entrepreneurship, commits scholars to a static view and a permanent anxiety about the moral worth of love-rhetoric. We offer an alternative conception of love-rhetoric as form of constitutive "living labor" and draw on this notion to forward a radically constitutive ontology of the subject.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)85-107
Number of pages23
JournalReview of Communication
Volume13
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 2013
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Communicative labor
  • Love
  • Moral entrepreneur
  • Rhetoric
  • Subjectivity

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Communication

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