I've been thinking a lot lately about my teaching philosophy and preparing to write a formal teaching philosophy statement. To that end, I've been revisiting rhetorical theory I'm already familiar with and reading new stuff too, and this afternoon I was reading Gerard A. Hauser's "Teaching Rhetoric: Or Why Rhetoric Isn't Just Another Kind of Philosophy or Literary Criticism," Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 34.3 (2004): 39-53. I'm working on a longer response to the article to cross-post here and at CultureCat, but for now I wanted to point out one particular passage. Hauser rightly points out the need for us as teachers of rhetoric to have "sustainable structures," centralized locations where we can exchange syllabi and other teaching materials (big time open content implications here, which I'll get into in the upcoming post). He explains the importance of having a site that "permits sharing information and participation in on-line discussion" (p. 44). The Alliance of Rhetoric Societies (ARS), Hauser writes, "has attempted to meet the first technical requirement for sustainable structures through the options for posting information and blog participation that are part of its homepage architecture" (p. 44-45, emphasis mine). Blog participation? I got curious and decided to check into this blog space. After a while I thought, God does not want me to find this blog. The architecture of the site might enable blog participation, but it didn't make it easy for me to find the blog, heh.

First, I went to the ARS site I knew about previously. Didn't find a link to a blog there, so I Googled "alliance of rhetoric societies" and found this site. Then I clicked on Links and Resources, then open forum, then the RSA resources page, then Blogora, then Please click here to access The Blogora. Only then did I get to The Blogora! About the blog:

The Blogora provides a collaborative space for connecting rhetoric, rhetorical methods and theories, and rhetoricians with public life. The Blogora is an initiative of the Rhetoric Society of America and is hosted by the Computer Writing and Research Lab, part of the Division of Rhetoric and Composition at The University of Texas at Austin. Standard disclaimer: Messages on this site are those of the writers; they do not express the views of the University of Texas or the DRC.

I realize The Blogora is very new and is just getting off the ground, but I hope they'll get in the network by adding a blogroll to their site, commenting on other people's blogs, and linking to / trackbacking other blogs in posts (and enabling trackback on The Blogora), because linking is like leaving breadcrumbs. :)