ENGL 309

Rhetoric of Science, Technology and Medicine (3 credits)

Instructor: Judy Segal
Section: 001
Term: 1

Rhetoric of Science and Medicine

In the seventeenth century, Thomas Sprat, in his History of the Royal Society, wrote that the ideal of science was a language of “such primitive purity and shortness that men deliver’d so many things in almost an equal number of words.” Scientific language today remains unadorned, but we know it is unadorned for a purpose and we know its appearance of being indifferent to persuasion makes it uniquely persuasive. Of what do the discourses of science and medicine persuade us?

This course looks at questions of persuasion in contemporary science and medicine.  At the centre of the course is a series of questions about scientific and medical rhetoric—both  internal (as professionals address each other), and external (as professionals, directly or indirectly, address the public).  Is the scientific paper, generically, as one of our authors (Peter Medawar) argues, “fraudulent”? 

We will be especially interested in health discourse in the public realm, and we will consider, for example, questions like these: “What is the process of classification by which some states/conditions become diseases and others do not?”, “What are the means, and what are the effects, of pharmaceutical advertising?” “How has the Internet helped to shape the contemporary health subject?”  Through our inquiry, we will specify how the rhetorical critic contributes to interdisciplinary Science and Medicine Studies.

English 309 is an introductory course; it requires no special preparation in rhetorical theory or in science and medicine.  

Readings:

• Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 3rd edition
• A course packet, including articles/book chapters by such authors as Christopher Lane (on the medicalization of shyness), Kimberly Emmons (on depression and “the rhetorical self”), Ethan Watters (on “the globalization of the American psyche”), Greg Myers (on scientific popularization), Carol Reeves (on discovery accounts in science) and Lorelei Lingard (on the rhetoric of uncertainty in clinical medicine).  Some introductory readings in rhetorical theory will be included in the course packet as well.

Course Requirements:

• Three short readings responses – 15%, 20%, 20% (respectively)
• Take-home exam – 35%
• Participation – 10%