Rhetorica

Abstract:

In their Traité de l’argumentation Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca declare themselves to be inspired by Aristotle’s dialectics and, contextually, to exclude Hegel’s dialectics from the horizon of Nouvelle Rhétorique. Yet, while some passages in the Traité account for their choice of Aristotle, the same cannot be said for their attitude towards Hegel, whose dialectics our two authors reject without criticism. Such rejection is actually in contrast with Nouvelle Rhétorique’s methodology, which is open to the examination of new meanings and usages in the philosophical field. In fact, when applied consistently, this methodology can discover similarities between Hegel’s dialectics and New Rhetoric, and remodel Perelman’s questions concerning tautology, analogy, philosophical pluralism, and the sense of audience.