Narratives in Rhetorical Discourse

Rhetoric can be defined as “the use of symbols to induce social action” (Hauser 2002: 3), thus making rhetorical discourse texts aimed at specific audiences for specific reasons in specific situations. While they are rarely complete narratives or completely narrative, such discourses often use narrative elements as means to their argumentative, convincing or otherwise motivational ends. The study of narratives in rhetorical discourse takes as its object discourses that primarily serve argumentative functions in contrast to aesthetic or didactic functions. It overlaps with subfields of narrative study, most importantly rhetorical narratology, research on storytelling (Norlyk, Wolff Lundholt & Hansen → Corporate Storytelling [1]) and Narrative Inquiry (Bamberg → Identity and Narration [2]). In contrast to more formal approaches to narrative such as classical narratology (Meister → Narratology [3]), these approaches share an interest in the ways in which narratives move or influence readers and audiences. They all understand narrative as situated in a communicative framework.

problem modifiable by discourse), a rhetorical audience (those "capable of being influenced by discourse and of being mediators of change") and constraints (persons or events with the "power to constrain decision and action needed to modify the exigence") (6-7). While often both highly artistic and formally elaborate, rhetorical discourse is thus a means to an end, and that end exists as a more or less explicit and changeable occurrence or state of affairs in the real world. Bitzer's insistence on this one-way causality between occurrence and rhetorical discourse (his example is the assassination of Kennedy) has since been challenged (Vatz 1973(Vatz , 2009) and modified (Hauser 2002;Kjeldsen 2008). However, the idea of distinguishing rhetorical discourse from, say, poetic or scientific discourse with recourse to the degree of manifest intentionality and function remains a crucial and distinctive move for this approach to rhetorical criticism.
The second way of delimiting the term "rhetorical discourse" takes its cue from Burke's notion of rhetoric as identification. A major thrust in Burke's work is the intention to expand the idea of what counts as rhetoric from the neo-Aristotelian notions of rhetorical discourse as finding the most persuasive elements in a given situation to a much broader concept of rhetoric as any more or less conscious process of identification through the use of symbols: "The difference between the 'old' rhetoric and the 'new' rhetoric may be summed up in this manner: whereas the key term for the 'old' rhetoric was persuasion and its stress was upon deliberate design, the key term for the 'new' rhetoric is identification and this may include partially 'unconscious' factors in its appeal" (Burke 1951: 203 Quintilian elaborates on the notion of narratives in rhetorical discourse as narratio, which he defines as "the persuasive exposition of that which either has been done, or is supposed to have been done " (1920: 67). Crucial to this exposition is that it avoids the temptation to dwell on artificiality, ornamentation and other forms of poetry: the narratio should remain as factual as possible.
Seen from the perspective of classical rhetoric, then, narratives in rhetorical discourse are or ought to be markedly different from invented narratives on a formal as well as on a functional level. Invented or fictional narratives strive towards formal complexity, ambiguity and turning points while narratives used in rhetorical discourse should strive for simplicity, clarity and reliability. Narratives used for rhetorical purpose should fit the situation in which they are employed; they should be persuasive in the Aristotelian sense of that term. According to Fisher, this insight calls for a major reorientation of rhetoric and communication studies. Rather than treating narrative as a specific genre or texttype, it should be seen as a meta-discourse, as a fundamental way of rationalizing behavior thanks to "narrative rationality." Fisher's position stands "in marked contrast to the view that narration is merely an element in rhetorical discourse or is a specific literary genre " (1984: 59 In order to analyze the relations between different narratives as well as between narratives and those who identify with them, Fisher introduces a distinction between what he calls narrative probability and narrative fidelity. A story worth identifying with must "ring true to the human condition" (Fisher 1987: 176). It accomplishes this by realizing a double coherence: internally, it must cohere as a structure (it must "hang together" and be "free of contradiction" (Fisher 1985: 349) A second, perhaps more fundamental problem, regards the epistemological omnipresence of narratives as stated by Fisher's idea of a paradigm. Rowland (1989 ) uses three case studies to argue convincingly against the description of narrative as a universal meta-discourse. Traditional rhetorical texts without storylines or plot as well as plot-rich fiction with strange entities clearly resist the application of narrative fidelity and probability. Rowland concludes that "the domain in which narrative approaches to rhetoric should be utilized is much narrower than Fisher and others have suggested " (1989: 51).

The premise informing Fisher's concept of the narrative paradigm is that a large part of actual argumentation, including most cases of individual and social decisionmaking, relies on narratives rather than on what is traditionally taken to
In a more indirect but also more consequential way, Lucaites and Condit (1985) voiced a similar critique, not only questioning the possibility and validity of a pan-narrative approach but also suggesting another way of studying narratives in rhetorical discourse.

Lucaites and Condit argue that narratives carry different functions in different
types of discourse. Their suggestion is thus diametrically opposed to the metadiscursive ambitions of the narrative paradigm. They distinguish between poetic, dialectic and rhetorical discourse, motivated by, respectively, the search for aesthetic pleasure, enlightenment and power. Drawing on Quintilian, they suggest analyzing narratives in rhetorical discourse on the basis of this type of discourse's need to be adapted to specific contexts, audiences and purposes. These three subfunctions all share the quality of specificity in that rhetorical discourse, as well as the narrative elements appearing in it, is bound to a specific situation.

The contextual sub-function stems from the fact that a rhetorical discourse is involved in an ongoing negotiation between at least two parties. This has two formal consequences. The first is that it requires a narrative within a rhetorical discourse to be unequivocal (it must "invite only one interpretation") in order to clearly state the rhetor's case. Second, because it is part of a discourse that attempts to move actual audiences to action, it must "stop short of the formal stage of plot 'resolution' by
virtue of its purpose to encourage audience enactment" (Lucaites & Condit 1985: 100).
The audience function is linked to the fact that rhetorical discourse is always directed at a specific audience. It also has two formal consequences, requiring that narrative rhetoric be consistent and concise. Consistency becomes important because the use of a narrative should be coherent internally and fit the context in which it occurs, meaning that it should strive to make sense in connection with the reality of the intended audience. The requirement of concision follows from the fact that rhetorical discourse should avoid putting unnecessary strain on the patience of the audience.

The third sub-function-purpose-is the one that most emphatically makes narratives in rhetoric stand apart from, say, fictional narratives. To Lucaites and
Condit, narratives in rhetorical discourse are always a true subset of a rhetorical artifact with an often very specific purpose, tied inextricably to the rhetor or sender of the artifact. The first formal consequence of this explicit link between a rhetorical artifact and its sender is that the narrative should aim for a "formal unity of narrator, author, and speaker" (101). The second consequence is that the ethos of the rhetor by necessity is connected to the impact of the narrative elements as well as vice versa.

Narratives as Lenses: Lucaites and Condit
As should be evident, Lucaites and Condit express doubts about the validity of Stroud has taken issue with aspects of the second problem in a series of articles (Stroud 2002(Stroud , 2003(Stroud , 2004. Challenging Fisher's ideas of probability and fidelity with a case that "involves contradictions at the level of values within a text and the Aristotle (1984). Rhetoric. J. Barnes (ed. Burke, Kenneth (1951). "Rhetoric Old and New." Journal of General Education 5, 202-09. Fisher, Walther (1984). "Narration as a Human Communication Paradigm."