Weaponized rhetoric

The U.S. Pentagon building viewed from above
TC Talk
Weaponized rhetoric
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Abi & Benton try to come to terms with the fact that information technology has not lived up to our greatest moral hopes for it. We compare our optimistic initial experiences with the internet to our pessimistic outlooks about it today. We discuss Ridolfo & Hart-Davidson’s book RhetOps: Rhetoric and Information Warfare, which reveals new ways that rhetorical knowledge can be weaponized by bad actors.

Sources and further reading

  • Bakke, A. (2020). Everyday Googling: Results of an observational study and applications for teaching algorithmic literacy. Computers and Composition, 57, 102577. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compcom.2020.102577
  • Brignull, H. (n.d.). Dark Patterns. Retrieved December 15, 2021, from https://www.darkpatterns.org/
  • Dombrowski, P. M. (1992). Challenger and the social contingency of meaning: Two lessons for the technical communication classroom. Technical Communication Quarterly, 1(3), 73–86.
  • Ethical Principles. (1998). Society for Technical Communication. https://www.stc.org/about-stc/ethical-principles/
  • Nashed, M. (2020, August 17). The Great Lie of the First Gulf War. OZY. https://www.ozy.com/true-and-stories/the-great-lie-of-the-first-gulf-war/271486/
  • Nayirah testimony. (2021). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nayirah_testimony&oldid=1056709570
  • Ridolfo, J., & Hart-Davidson, W. (2019). Rhet Ops: Rhetoric and Information Warfare. University of Pittsburgh Press.
    • Mills, G. “Revisiting ‘A soldier’s guide to rhetorical theory’: Intelligence analysis in the open.”
    • Kreuter, N. “Rhetoric and the US intelligence community’s misuses of theory.”
    • Gagnon, J. “Minerva rising: The Pentagon’s weaponization of rhetorical knowledge.”
    • Trice, M. “Gamergate: Understanding the tactics of online knowledge disruptors.”
    • Gallagher, J. “Dark interactions: Interfaces and object arrays as surveillance in digital rhetoric.”
  • Sagan, C. (1961). The Planet Venus. Science, 133(3456), 849–858.
  • Tannen, D. (1999). The Argument Culture: Stopping America’s War of Words. Ballantine Books.