Eastern Communication Association

In the past decades, rhetorical criticism has expanded to include public places, both memory sites and more mundane ones such as parks, stadiums, and bridges. Undergraduate instruction should reflect this progress by offering coursework in public places. This short course leads attendees through a forthcoming textbook by Sheckels, Hyden, and Bennie (November 2024) that discusses different types of places ranging from the nation's many war memorials to Disney World, the Brooklyn Bridge, and Orioles Park at Camden Yard. Then, the short course focuses on the probes--drawn from traditional rhetoric, more contemporary rhetoric, visual rhetoric, work in cognate areas such as social geography, and fieldwork--that students might use in "reading" places, concluding with discussions of two Boston places and how they might be taught.