Victor Vitanza
Encyclopedia
Victor J. Vitanza is a Professor of English at Clemson University
(South Carolina). He is the Director of the interdisciplinary-transdisciplinary Ph.D. program in Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design, which is situated in the College of Architecture, Arts, and Humanities.
Formerly at University of Texas at Arlington
(1982-2005), Vitanza works in Media and Communication Philosophy, but that work also finds him teaching summer seminars at the European Graduate School
(EGS) in (Saas-Fee
, Switzerland), where he holds the Jean-Francois Lyotard Chair. Previously he earned his second PhD at EGS under the title "Chaste Rape: Sexual Violence, Canon Formation, and Rhetorical Cultures" (director, Wolfgang Schirmacher
; readers, Alain Badiou
and Giorgio Agamben
).
In 1978-1979 Vitanza received a National Endowment for Humanities Fellowship-in-Residence to work with Richard E. Young at Carnegie-Mellon University (Pittsburgh) on the topic of "Rhetorical Invention." Other participants included Sharon Bassett, James A. Berlin, Lisa Ede, David Fractenberg, Robert P. Inkster, Charles Kneupper, Sam Watson, Jr., Vickie Winkler, and William Nelson. Other participating colleagues included Peter Becker
, Linda Flower
, and Janice Lauer, all important figures in the field of Rhetoric and Composition.
Vitanza went on to found and publish the quarterly journal PRE/TEXT (1980-). Along with Cynthia Haynes, Vitanza started the E-journal, Pre/Text: Electra(Lite) and created an on-line forum called Re/Inter/View listserv that currently has over 500 members. The month-long archived discussions hosted a range of figures from rhetoric and composition and elsewhere including Noam Chomsky
, Jane Gallop
, Sharon Crowley, and Geoffrey Sirc.
's electracy
to the field of rhetorical historiographies, or what Vitanza calls "hysteriography" (and later "schizography"). Vitanza's efforts are to reread and rewrite questions and concepts raised by such theorists and historians as Gilles Deleuze
Deleuze, Samuel Ijsseling, Giorgio Agamben
, and Jean-François Lyotard
. Vitanza deploys these figures to consider and disrupt the role of negation and subjectivity in "the" history of rhetoric.
Negation, Subjectivity, and The History of Rhetoric (1997) is the title of Vitanza's first book. His efforts are large-scale re-assessments of the sense of negation that Kenneth Burke helps define. Vitanza's efforts extend to a reconsideration of other figures important to rhetorical historiography such as Susan Jarrett, Edward Schiappa, and John Poulakos. Through it all, Vitanza seeks a movement from (negative) possibilities and probabilities to (denegated) incompossibilities (counter-factual, co-extensive possibilities).
In Vitanza's recent work, he challenges Leibniz's foundational example of using Sextus's rape of Lucretia to ground a conception of "the best of all possible worlds." Extending Deleuze's re-reading of Leibniz in The Fold and Agamben's sense of "decreation," Vitanza seeks after all the denegated incompossibilities that result when "what happened and what did not happen are returned to their originary unity" (Agamben's Potentialities 270).
Vitanza's long-term project, according to a description on his website, is entitled Design as Dasein, and it "will examine how philosophical and architectural attitudes are represented under the signs of negativity and death."
From Vitanza's "final(rebeginning?) excursis" in NSHR: "WHAT WILL HAVE BEEN ANTI-OEDIPAL (De-Negated) HYSTERIES OF RHETORICS? WHAT WILL HAVE THEY LOOKED, SOUNDED, READ LIKE?" (22, emphasis Vitanza)
Clemson University
Clemson University is an American public, coeducational, land-grant, sea-grant, research university located in Clemson, South Carolina, United States....
(South Carolina). He is the Director of the interdisciplinary-transdisciplinary Ph.D. program in Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design, which is situated in the College of Architecture, Arts, and Humanities.
Formerly at University of Texas at Arlington
University of Texas at Arlington
The University of Texas at Arlington is a public research university located in Arlington, Texas, United States. The campus is situated southwest of downtown Arlington, and is located in the Dallas–Fort Worth metropolitan area. The university was founded in 1895 and served primarily a military...
(1982-2005), Vitanza works in Media and Communication Philosophy, but that work also finds him teaching summer seminars at the European Graduate School
European Graduate School
The European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland is a privately funded graduate school founded by the non-profit European Foundation of Interdisciplinary Studies. Its German name is Europäische Universität für Interdisziplinäre Studien...
(EGS) in (Saas-Fee
Saas-Fee
Saas-Fee is the main village in the Saastal, or the Saas Valley, and is a municipality in the district of Visp in the canton of Valais in Switzerland...
, Switzerland), where he holds the Jean-Francois Lyotard Chair. Previously he earned his second PhD at EGS under the title "Chaste Rape: Sexual Violence, Canon Formation, and Rhetorical Cultures" (director, Wolfgang Schirmacher
Wolfgang Schirmacher
Wolfgang Schirmacher is an editor and educator in the field of philosophy and the program director at the European Graduate School. He has edited many journals and written books, as well as developed curriculum in philosophical disciplines at major universities.-Biography:Schirmacher has taught...
; readers, Alain Badiou
Alain Badiou
Alain Badiou is a French philosopher, professor at European Graduate School, formerly chair of Philosophy at the École Normale Supérieure . Along with Giorgio Agamben and Slavoj Žižek, Badiou is a prominent figure in an anti-postmodern strand of continental philosophy...
and Giorgio Agamben
Giorgio Agamben
Giorgio Agamben is an Italian political philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception and homo sacer....
).
In 1978-1979 Vitanza received a National Endowment for Humanities Fellowship-in-Residence to work with Richard E. Young at Carnegie-Mellon University (Pittsburgh) on the topic of "Rhetorical Invention." Other participants included Sharon Bassett, James A. Berlin, Lisa Ede, David Fractenberg, Robert P. Inkster, Charles Kneupper, Sam Watson, Jr., Vickie Winkler, and William Nelson. Other participating colleagues included Peter Becker
Peter Becker
Peter Becker is a German Molecular biologist.He studied biology at the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg till 1984. And finished his Ph.D at the German Cancer Research Center and the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg in 1987....
, Linda Flower
Linda Flower
Linda Flower is a composition theorist. She is best known for her emphasis on cognitive rhetoric, but has more recently published in the field of service learning. Flower currently serves Carnegie Mellon University as a professor of rhetoric.-Independent works:*"Cognition, Context, and Theory...
, and Janice Lauer, all important figures in the field of Rhetoric and Composition.
Vitanza went on to found and publish the quarterly journal PRE/TEXT (1980-). Along with Cynthia Haynes, Vitanza started the E-journal, Pre/Text: Electra(Lite) and created an on-line forum called Re/Inter/View listserv that currently has over 500 members. The month-long archived discussions hosted a range of figures from rhetoric and composition and elsewhere including Noam Chomsky
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...
, Jane Gallop
Jane Gallop
Jane Anne Gallop is an American professor who since 1992 has served as Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, where she has taught since 1990.- Education :Gallp earned a B.A...
, Sharon Crowley, and Geoffrey Sirc.
Work
Vitanza's work concentrates on histories of rhetorics and specifically on a "third sophistic" as well as the "excluded middle." His efforts extend the implications of Gregory UlmerGregory Ulmer
Gregory Leland Ulmer is a professor in the Department of English at the University of Florida and a professor of Electronic Languages and Cybermedia at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland.- Career :...
's electracy
Electracy
Electracy describes the kind of “literacy” or skill and facility necessary to exploit the full communicative potential of new electronic media such as multimedia, hypermedia, social software, and virtual worlds...
to the field of rhetorical historiographies, or what Vitanza calls "hysteriography" (and later "schizography"). Vitanza's efforts are to reread and rewrite questions and concepts raised by such theorists and historians as Gilles Deleuze
Gilles Deleuze
Gilles Deleuze , was a French philosopher who, from the early 1960s until his death, wrote influentially on philosophy, literature, film, and fine art. His most popular works were the two volumes of Capitalism and Schizophrenia: Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus , both co-written with Félix...
Deleuze, Samuel Ijsseling, Giorgio Agamben
Giorgio Agamben
Giorgio Agamben is an Italian political philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception and homo sacer....
, and Jean-François Lyotard
Jean-François Lyotard
Jean-François Lyotard was a French philosopher and literary theorist. He is well known for his articulation of postmodernism after the late 1970s and the analysis of the impact of postmodernity on the human condition...
. Vitanza deploys these figures to consider and disrupt the role of negation and subjectivity in "the" history of rhetoric.
Negation, Subjectivity, and The History of Rhetoric (1997) is the title of Vitanza's first book. His efforts are large-scale re-assessments of the sense of negation that Kenneth Burke helps define. Vitanza's efforts extend to a reconsideration of other figures important to rhetorical historiography such as Susan Jarrett, Edward Schiappa, and John Poulakos. Through it all, Vitanza seeks a movement from (negative) possibilities and probabilities to (denegated) incompossibilities (counter-factual, co-extensive possibilities).
In Vitanza's recent work, he challenges Leibniz's foundational example of using Sextus's rape of Lucretia to ground a conception of "the best of all possible worlds." Extending Deleuze's re-reading of Leibniz in The Fold and Agamben's sense of "decreation," Vitanza seeks after all the denegated incompossibilities that result when "what happened and what did not happen are returned to their originary unity" (Agamben's Potentialities 270).
Vitanza's long-term project, according to a description on his website, is entitled Design as Dasein, and it "will examine how philosophical and architectural attitudes are represented under the signs of negativity and death."
From Vitanza's "final(rebeginning?) excursis" in NSHR: "WHAT WILL HAVE BEEN ANTI-OEDIPAL (De-Negated) HYSTERIES OF RHETORICS? WHAT WILL HAVE THEY LOOKED, SOUNDED, READ LIKE?" (22, emphasis Vitanza)
External links
- Victor Vitanza Faculty page at European Graduate SchoolEuropean Graduate SchoolThe European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland is a privately funded graduate school founded by the non-profit European Foundation of Interdisciplinary Studies. Its German name is Europäische Universität für Interdisziplinäre Studien...
with biography, bibliography, articles and photos