The Canadian Society for the Study of Rhetoric
RhetCanada’s 2024 conference will be a joint event that takes place online on June 8 and in person from June 12-14 in association with the 2024 Congress of the Social Sciences and Humanities at McGill University, Montreal. The 2024 RhetCanada conference theme is “Where’s the Rhetoric?” See our Call for Proposals.
Kyle Gerber has received RhetCanada’s Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award for his paper, “Re-imagining the Rhetorical Powers of Prayer,” presented at the 2023 RhetCanada conference. The committee offered the following comments:
Kyle’s study of prayer as devotional practice and theological site (with reference to Amish programs of spiritual formation and attitude) was interesting and demonstrated a sustained engagement with the thinking of Kenneth Burke. His paper provided a sustained, textured rhetorical treatment, and his delivery was engaged, confident, and invested in his topic. The work had a depth and maturity and commitment.
Congratulations Kyle!
The programme for RhetCanada’s 2023 conference, which will be held May 30-June 1 at York University in association with the 2023 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, is now available. We hope to see you there, either in person or online!
RhetCanada will be holding its 2023 annual conference from May 30-June 1 at York University in Toronto, in association with the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences.
Our conference theme this year is Rhetoric, Reckonings, and Re-imaginings, and we welcome paper proposals in both English and French on a broad range of rhetoric-related topics. See our Call for Proposals for more information on the conference and how to submit a proposal. The deadline for submissions is Jan. 20. If you have any questions related to the conference, contact RhetCanada president Bruce Dadey.
We’re pleased to announce the RhetCanada student paper award winners for 2022. The quality of the graduate and undergraduate presentations this year was outstanding, so congratulations to the winners and thanks to all those who presented!
The winner of the Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award for an outstanding paper by a graduate student was Máire Slater, for her paper “The Rhetoric of Reconciliation in the Music of Ubu and the Truth Commission”:
It is with great pleasure that the Student Prize Committee congratulates Máire Slater of the University of Waterloo on winning this year’s Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award, for her paper and presentation entitled “The Rhetoric of Reconciliation in the Music of Ubu and the Truth Commission.” The committee was unanimous in its decision, agreeing that Máire’s paper was not only of excellent quality in its written and presented forms, but also applied a very high standard of rhetorical scholarship to the analysis of a significant artefact. The clarity of the integration of musical theory in a manner accessible to non-specialists, and the attentiveness to the rhetorical dimensions of composition and performance were outstanding.
This award is given in honour of the late Michael Purves-Smith, and the Committee also wishes to acknowledge how Michael, with his deep commitment to the rhetorical possibilities of music, would have appreciated Máire’s paper and presentation. Máire’s engaged and nuanced investigation of music as a site of and vehicle for rhetorical action would reassure Michael that RhetCanada continues to attract a breadth of scholarship of the highest calibre.
The winners of the RhetCanada Undergraduate Paper Award are Queenie Chen and Romina Hashemi for their paper “‘im gonna destroy the world before it destroys me’: Rhetoric and Construction Grammar”:
The RhetCanada Student Prize Committee is very pleased to announce that Queenie Chen and Romina Hashemi of the University of Waterloo are the 2022 winners of the RhetCanada Student Paper Award, for their paper “‘im gonna destroy the world before it destroys me’: Rhetoric and Construction Grammar.”
This well-prepared and engagingly presented paper offered a thought-provoking introduction to the role of grammatical structure in the construction and deployment of rhetorical figures. Queenie and Romina were attentive to the needs of an audience whose approach to rhetorical theory and criticism is diverse; they grounded their discussion of construction grammar as an approach and of the rhetorical figures such as chiasmus, antimetalepsis, and mesodiplosis in accessible terms which pointed the audience to exciting new directions for rhetorical inquiry.
We congratulate Queenie and Romina on their fine work and hope they will continue to share their important scholarship with RhetCanada in the future.
The programme for RhetCanada’s 2022 annual conference is now available. RhetCanada 2022 will take place online from June 1-3, 2022. The theme for this year’s conference is Rhetoric: (Re)Conciliation, Resilience, Recovery.
To register for the conference, see our conference registration page.
The 2022 RhetCanada annual conference will take place online from June 1-3, 2022. The theme for this year’s conference is Rhetoric: (Re)Conciliation, Resilience, Recovery.
We welcome paper proposals related to our conference theme and on a broad range of topics related to the theory, history, and practice of rhetoric. See our Call for Proposals for details about the conference and how to submit a proposal. The deadline for proposals is January 10, 2022.
Congratulations to the two co-winners of RhetCanada’s Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award for 2021:
Congratulations as well to Maša Torbica, who won the Honourable Mention prize for her paper “Connective Activism: #Ottawapiskat and the Third Space of Sovereignty”
There were a number of outstanding papers this year, so the committee’s work was especially challenging. Thanks to all who presented!
The RhetCanada 2021 Schedule is now available!
RhetCanada 2021 will be from June 2-4 at the CFHSS online Congress. Schedule forthcoming!