Stanley Fish predicted this...

I feel like I'm still not in stasis, if you will, with the discussion on Crowley and actually one reason why I talked so much in class last time is that I felt like a lot of what I saw Crowley is *trying* to do overall in my working through the text (the first half of the book, as this is what we were talking about at the time) was falling by the wayside as we were talking about our reactions to what might be called her tone and examples, and I wanted to unpack those elements. I pointed out in class and in my posts before class (see below) the following: Crowley doesn't make broad claims against all Christians, but rather is concerned with those who have sought to reconstitute the role of faith in politics--to merge the private with the public; that Crowley's project is to demonstrate that *fundamentalist* (and/or apocalyptic) Christianity has become a dominant hegemony in the U.S. and a challenge to the competing "default" hegemony of liberalism; that the values inherent to liberalism “double" as values inherent to democracy, and so the challenge to them must be engaged if liberal democracy is to be preserved; but that liberal rhetoric is ill-suited to engage fundamentalist Christianity because stasis between liberalism and Christian fundamentalism is not met; and so a reformulated rhetorical theory, one that marries a postmodern orientation with rhetorical strategies--both modern and ancient (I explained this in class and Dr. Strickland then did the nice schematic on the board)--is better-suited for engaging the new hegemony (here I've actually just copied, pasted, and edited the first part of my last entry which was posted before class last time).

The reason why I stress what I see to be the central points in Crowley thus far is that It seems to me like Crowley's work is still being conflated with an attack on Christianity, in general, and that her overall point is still being lost in the translation. First, however, I want to acknowledge that what I see now that I've read the second half of the book is that much of this is her own fault. Like Kevin, I see both others' points about it being a one-sided argument and that it's a missed opportunity. What seems like a promising overall project--minding the gap between these two hegemonies--is often lost in digressive screeds that she either never brings back and reconnects or does so in a scattershot and rushed manner (both Kevin and David S point this out very well in thier respective posts). The worst aspects of the first half of the book are writ large and given center stage in the second half (as Faith promised they would last week). The end result then, is the feeling that, as David S says, while "...Crowley's original idea is a good one: to look at the current debates that seem to divid people and see if there's a way to bring rhetoric into the mix... The 'new' angle that Crowley wishes to add to the mix--ancient rhetoric, with a twist, as a possible solution--never really takes flight." And so, somewhat like Chad, I'm left wondering "how to incorporate Crowely's ideas, aside from stressing to students the need for pathos."

I do, however, think that Crowley is on to something--like I said last week, she's like Berlin in that she sees a crisis. Berlin calls it the culture wars, while Crowely resists using such a loaded term (I think she would have been better off if she went that route, however--as I said last week, I think it's her use of religion that trips so many wires). She'd much rather set her sights on this one specific aspect of the divide. Again, while Crowley shoots herself in the foot in discussing Christianity (and while she maybe should have actually spent *more* time defining her terms), I don't think that she's framing her argument in terms of liberalism versus Christianity as a whole (and if she is, I'm missing it--and once it's shown to me, I'll abadon my support of her argument and throw it behind the ghost that I've created in her place). Nor do I think she fails to acknowledge that there those who describe themselves as fundamentalist Christians who *also* aren't who she's talking about (for her discussion of this, once again, revisit pages 6-9). I think she acknowledges the complexity of Christianity early on, then moves to solely discussing those she sees as trying to enact a theonomy in the United States, that is, those who are *actively trying to introduce their version of Christianity into the political sphere*. In terms of whether or not there are fundamentalist Christians who are trying to incorporate their faith into the Constitution, etc. (both those outside of government and within government already), I think there is no disputing the fact (see Terry Schiavo, gay marriage, etc.) and it's intellecutally dishonest to say otherwise. Whether or not this effort is a credible threat (or, indeed, not something to be welcomed) or whether it's a lot of talk (done for money, votes, or both) is a matter of debate, obviously. I tend to see the intersection of sincere faith and demcracy as indeed being a site of ongoing struggle (both personal and public) that has existed since the founding of the nation, and so maybe Crowley's alarmist tone is a little unwarranted. But I also think we should articulate what she's actually saying first.

Once we have, I think it's fruitful to move on to some of the many justified objections and qualifications that have been made. I think Faith makes several *excellent* points in her discussion of how complexity-points that no number of qualifications on Crowley's part can resist. Faith details the number of authors who have studied faith in a perhaps more "authentic" (my word, not Faith's) way. Faith describes Amy Frykholm as opening her _Rapture Culture_ "with a moving and candid story about [her] own spirituality, how it conflicts with her feminist views, and her admission that 'I could not resolve the tension between my dislike for the books and my appreciation of their readers' (9)." Faith also quotes James Barr, who asserts that fundamentialism is more of an "ecumenical problem" within Christianity, one of a radical group outside of the mainstream. Faith goes on to make excellent points, citing Paul Boyer and Susan Harding, problematizing Crowley's characterizations of the influence of fundamentalism, and Faith points out (I can't say it any better) that these writers "don't see hegemony--they see complexity.... They seem to be talking about real people as opposed to a disembodied discourse." For me, this last turn of phrase really put a fine point on it--again, I don't think we (including Crowley) are all in stasis. I think Faith's excellent summary of her objections to Crowley demonstrate how Crowley failed to perform precisely what she advocates. Faith's post reminded me of something that I thought of last week, of how there have been very similar discussions about essentially the same problem, only instead of "liberalism" and "fundamentalism," the other surrogate actors--"Democrats" (liberals) and "Republicans" (conservatives), or "blue states" and "red states" (again, the "culture wars") were used. I remember reading about how many who live in so-called "red states" feel that Democrats simply don't understand them, don't speak in a common language, and ultimately seem to dismiss and disrespect them.

The discussion surrounded several books that were published around the same, including Thomas Frank's _What's the Matter with Kansas?_ (which Crowley discusses briefly early on), George Lakoff's _Dont Think of an Elephant_, and especially Jim Wallis' _God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It_. Lakoff, a linguist, makes much of a similar argument to that of Crowley, arguing that those who want to combat the conservative hegemony need to learn how to frame their arguments to counter their co-opting of much of the language. Franks points out that Kansans (a surrogate for many who live in pretty much every red state) vote against their economic interests because they identify with Republicans who speak to them in *emotional* terms--they speak of "traditional values" and warn of the looney left's designs to destroy those values. Wallis, in a way, mirrors Crowley (and in a way turns her on her head). Wallis is himself an evangelical Christian and the editor of _Soujourners_ magazine. But he agrees with Crowley both in that there are problems on both sides of divide and that liberals are the best canidates to solve the problem. Very much like Crowely he sees cause for alarm: Wallis belives that Christianity's true purpose is to serve God by focussing on social ills (things like war, poverty, lack of health care and education, not sexuality and censorship). He feels that liberal values and "authentic" Christian values largely dovetail, but that liberals have treated religion as anathema while conservatives have co-opted religion as a way to polarize the country, get elected and stay in power. Like Crowley, Willis wants to bridge the divide, calling for a hybridization of religion and liberalism, where spiritual guidance is married with liberal causes. Just as Crowley wishes to reintroduce pathos and belief to reconstitute a rhetoric of persuasion, Willis wishes to reintroduce faith into liberal discourse.

Having read these books, I thought that Crowley was doing much of the same thing with rhetoric per se--and she is, I guess--only not as successfully.