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RhetCanada Student Paper Award Winners 2022

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!

Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award

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.

RhetCanada Undergraduate Paper Award

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.

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RhetCanada 2022 CFP Available

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.

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Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award Winners 2021

Congratulations to the two co-winners of RhetCanada’s Michael Purves-Smith Student Paper Award for 2021:

  • Maab Alkurdi, for her paper “Bitterly Rhetorical: Terror in the Autobiography of Zainab Salbi”
  • Shannon Lodoen, for her paper “Where is ‘Here’ and Who is ‘We’? Rhetorically Constructing a Unified Canada”

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!

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Rhetor 8.1 is Now Available

We’re happy to announce that a special issue of our journal, Rhetor 8.1, is now available. The issue, guest edited by David Beard, focuses on the role of national identity in rhetoric scholarship and features articles from a wide variety of Canadian and international rhetoricians.

Previous issues of Rhetor can be accessed from our Rhetor Volumes page.

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Statement in Support of the Black Canadian Studies Association

As an association, RhetCanada would like to express our support for the Black Canadian Studies Association and to urge the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences to concretely re-commit to a Congress on the theme of colonialism and anti-Black racism as soon as possible, given both the current urgency and ongoing importance of the theme. We also urge the Federation to implement strategies to better support the work of scholars who are Black, Indigenous, and people of colour, and we commit to finding ways to better include and support these scholars and their communities within our own association. 

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CFP: RhetCanada 2021 Annual Conference, Online June 2-4

A number of people connect on digital devices.

RhetCanada will hold its 2021 annual conference as part of the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences. Both the Congress and RhetCanada’s conference will be held online in 2021.

The conference will take place June 2-4, 2021. Our conference theme, which is carried over from last year’s postponed conference,  is “Bridging Divides.”

Presenters whose papers were accepted for last year’s conference can present them at this year’s conference, and we are also accepting new proposals for papers. See our 2021 Call for Proposals for further information.

The deadline for new paper proposal submissions is January 15, 2021.

Keep updated on the conference by following the news on our website, following us on Twitter (@rhetcan), or joining our Facebook group.

We look forward to hearing your accepted papers and receiving your new proposals!

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RhetCanada 2020 Conference Postponed

RhetCanada’s 2020 conference is postponed due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Here are some important things to note about this postponement:

  • Proposals that have been accepted for this year’s RhetCanada meeting are also accepted for the 2021 meeting at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. If a significant number of people with accepted proposals cannot attend the 2021 meeting, we will re-issue a call for proposals to bring in new presenters.
  • The RhetCanada membership dues paid last year for 2019-2020 will be extended to 2021, so members who paid dues in June 2019 will remain RhetCanada members without paying additional dues until our meeting in June 2021. If you did not pay dues last year but wish to become a member of RhetCanada, we encourage you to visit our Join Us page.
  • We will still be holding the 2020 RhetCanada annual general meeting, but as a live (synchronous) online event. The 2020 RhetCanada AGM will take place on Thursday, June 4 from 4:00-5:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time. Our annual meeting is important to the ongoing functioning of our association, so we cordially invite all members to attend. Instructions for attending the meeting online, along with an agenda, reports, and early notices of motions will be distributed to members over the coming weeks.
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RhetCanada 2020 Call for Proposals Now Available

The call for proposals for RhetCanada’s 2020 conference is now available!

The conference will take place June 3-5, 2020 at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, which will be held at Western University in London, Ontario. Our conference theme, which echoes the Congress theme, is “Bridging Divides.” The deadline for paper proposal submissions is January 10, 2020.

Keep updated on the conference by following the news on our website, following us on Twitter (@rhetcan), or joining our Facebook group.

We look forward to receiving your proposals!

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RhetCanada 2019 Graduate Student Prize Winner: Nicolas Noble

Attendees at RhetCanada’s 2019 annual meeting in Vancouver heard papers from senior scholars and emerging graduate students for the RhetCanada Graduate Student Prize. Judging the grad student prize was challenging once again.  Judges David Beard, incoming RhetCanada President Bruce Dadey, and outgoing RhetCanada President Tania Smith awarded this year’s prize to Nicolas Noble for his paper “Myths of Community: Legal Fictions and Rhetoric in Canadian Religious Freedom.”  Noble focused on the provincial and federal hearings related to Trinity Western University’s recent legal bid to open a law school.  The presentation explored the rhetorical strategies formulated by Trinity Western’s leadership in advancing their legal case.

Congratulations Nicolas.

RhetCanada looks forward to next year’s grad student presentations in London, Ontario!