Do our leaders use well-thought-out logic or convoluted arguments in their speeches? How do filmmakers use visual language to communicate to a mass audience? What gender representations exist in the military’s sexual harassment disputes? How good are the arguments for harsher prison sentences, and how effective are civil rights protests? Students of rhetoric and film at Whitman College find themselves examining the dynamics of communication by which all of our societal institutions operate. The study of rhetoric, nearly 2,500 years old, has always been central to the objectives of a liberal arts curriculum. Both the college and the Rhetoric and Film Studies Department believe we offer students the opportunity to better analyze the written and spoken word and the moving images as part of a broader, liberal arts approach to communication.

Rhetoric is a specialized branch of communication that emphasizes persuading others to confront problems we face everyday. Through this communicative process, we come to know and understand our world. Courses in our department treat rhetoric as it occurs in film, speeches, television, the written word and a whole multitude of media as a liberal art, proposing that communication is not a skill learned by rule but an exercise of judgement that can be no better than the communicator’s understanding of the nature of the communicative act. This understanding of how words and images are interpreted and given meaning is a vital part of who we are and how we make some of the most significant decisions in our lives.

Isocrates emphasizes the importance of the study of rhetoric when he said, “None of the things which are done with intelligence take place without the help of speech, but that in all our actions as well as in all of our thoughts speech is our guide, and is most employed by those who have the most wisdom.” Similarly, John Cassavettes underscored the power of the visual language of film to shape culture when he said, “Maybe there really wasn’t ever an America. Maybe it was only Frank Capra.” In short, the study of rhetorical forms explores the centrality of symbolic communication as essential to the construction of contemporary life.

As a department, we have four primary components. First, we offer Fundamentals of Public Address, a course that focuses on the study of public presentation. Second, we provide study of rhetorical theory and history in courses such as Argument in the Law and Politics, Rhetoric and Film Criticism, Background of African-American Protest Rhetoric, Persuasion, Agitation, and Social Movement, and Freedom of Speech and the First Amendment. Third, in our film and media studies courses we examine various media from an intellectual and artistic point of view, concentrating on the various ways narrative, lighting, characters, camera shots, and cultural representations are constructed. Fourth, the department offers intensive study through our Forensics Program in Policy Debate, Parliamentary Debate, and Public Speaking Events. For detailed information about the Speech and Debate Program, see the Rhetoric and Film Studies Department home page.