Rhetoric and the Social Imaginary

Description

Modern rhetoric is not limited to examining the role of language in politics, culture and society, but also includes the study of the conditions and circumstances of communication practices in a broad sense – both historical and technological. Over the past decade, a school of thought has taken shape at the department, focusing on theoretical problems linked to changes in and developments of communication practices and technologies. The research group Rhetoric and the Social Imaginary is a gathering place for research and investigation of these issues.

The social imaginary refers to the symbolic matrix through and within which a group of people, a society or a culture, etc., imagines itself and acts as a collective, world-shaping actor. Thus, the social imaginary has to do with how a human group perceives and values itself through its specific way of shaping its world, its values and its place in this world. Or, with a focus on the concept of social meaning: ‘The social imaginary is not a collection of ideas, but rather that which enables and gives meaning to the practices of a society.’ (Charles Taylor, Modern Social Imaginaries, Duke, Duke University Press, 2004, p. 91)

The social imaginary is multi-layered, exists in all societies and is at the same time specific to a particular society during a certain period in history. It constitutes a fundamental prerequisite for the development of human meaning. Against the backdrop of a society's or an era's social imaginary, it becomes possible to describe how this society distinguishes between real and fictional, me and others, us and them, good and evil. The social imaginary of our respective societies is what makes us the specific people we are – at the same time, the social imaginary is often perceived as an objective, neutral presentation and understanding of reality – we humans move in the social imaginary of our society and time like fish in water.

Issues related to the social imaginary and how it can be linked to both rhetorical theory and practice have been investigated by researchers at the department in areas such as epistemology, linguistics, history of ideas, anthropology, political theory, ideology criticism, psychoanalysis and critical theory.

Examples of topics included in this broad field are rhetorical perspectives on how doxa and ideologies affect the understanding of concepts such as violence or freedom, or influence social practices from diplomacy to meme culture; the rhetoric of computer games; the return of mass psychology; the role and forms of propaganda in contemporary society; how social meaning is created and transformed; how political identities and opinions take shape; what supranational and subcultural practices for identity creation look like.