Gender Roles and Rhetoric

I ended up attending the Renegotiating Boundaries on American Literature, and Rhetoric of World Leaders Friday morning sessions of the English Symposium. Each session had deeply intriguing portions in addition to violently boring portions. I shall make this a positive blog post and devote my attention to the intriguing portions. 

In the first session a women named Morgan presented a paper on the concept of the "manic pixie dream girl." What I found interesting about her research was not so much the content presented, but that she essentially traced the history and evolution of an archetype from its conception. The manic pixie dream girl is an archetype for women that originated in Victorian England and continued on in American literature until it reached its current form. This presentation was engaging because it was a unique way to analyze an archetype.

In the second session the presenters focused on rhetoric and how it has been used by influential world leaders. One of them in articular gave a brief examination of the nature of rhetoric itself, which was educational. The presenter used several quotes to showcase that rhetoric is a means for altering the reality of the world. I enjoyed this presentation because it was  a good way to show the practical use of rhetoric, as opposed to the sometimes too prevalent classroom version of it.