If rhetoric is the art of speaking, who is listening? In Being-Moved, Daniel M. Gross provides an answer, showing when and where the art of speaking parted ways with the art of listening – and what happens when they intersect once again. Much in the history of rhetoric must be rethought along the way. And much of this rethinking pivots around Martin Heidegger’s early lectures on Aristotle’s Rhetoric where his famous topic, Being, gives way to being-moved. The results, Gross goes on to show, are profound. Listening to the gods, listening to the world around us, and even listening to one another in the classroom – all of these experiences become different when rhetoric is reoriented from the voice to the ear.

About the Author

Daniel M. Gross is Professor of English and Affiliated Faculty in the Critical Theory Emphasis at UC Irvine, where he is also Campus Writing & Communication Coordinator. He is the author or coeditor of six books, including The Secret History of Emotion: From Aristotle's Rhetoric to Modern Brain Science.

Acknowledgments

Introduction to the Art of Listening

1. Martin Heidegger on Listening c. 1924

2. Being-Moved: A Disciplinary Prehistory

3. Face-to-Face Communication, Disfigured

4. Passive Voices, Active Listening: A Case Study in Rhetoric
and Composition

Appendix: The Art of Listening in Select English Manuals
and Sermons, 1582–1665

Notes
Works Cited with Additional Suggested Readings
Index

Reviews

"Being-Moved: Rhetoric as the Art of Listening is a brilliant and courageous work that in effect ‘moves’ the reader to reconsider the often neglected art of listening and to reflect on one’s thoughts in order to take whatever action one might deem necessary to live fully and authentically in the public realm. Daniel M. Gross’s assessment of Martin Heidegger’s Marburg lectures on Aristotle, as well as Philip Melanchthon’s reflections on rhetoric are substantial and original."
— The European Legacy

"In Being-Moved, Daniel M. Gross challenges us to rethink rhetorical studies in its history, theory, and pedagogy. He persuasively questions the traditional privilege given the speaker or writer as the significant communication agent, emphasizing instead—with the help of Martin Heidegger's rereading of Aristotle—a long history of rhetoric as the art of listening. Carefully researched and artfully argued, this tour-de-force study will capture the imagination of rhetoricians across the human sciences as well as scholars in philosophy, intellectual history, and cultural studies."––Steven Mailloux, author of Rhetoric's Pragmatism: Essays in Rhetorical Hermeneutics

"Investigating 'the ear of democracy' in order to address our current 'erosion of public debate,' Being-Moved: Rhetoric as the Art of Listening contributes to the recovery of listening within rhetorical studies. Contextualizing listening within philosophy, religion, communication, poetics, psychoanalysis, and rhetoric and composition studies, this book is an engaging read for students of listening."––Krista Ratcliffe, author of Rhetorical Listening: Identification, Gender, Whiteness

About the Book

About the Author

Table of Contents

Reviews