Abstract

This study introduces and defends a social perspective of an enthymeme in which author, text, and audience are interdependent. The argument itself within a broad collaborative invention process characterizes the social perspective of an enthymeme as well as a relational activity between author and audience that is multidirectional, cooperative, and dialogic. In its social perspective, an enthymeme concerns rhetorical issues and focuses on the argument context rather than the argument form, especially the author-audience interaction that is natural to argumentation. In composition practice, an enthymeme as the argument itself acquires a new function as an ongoing heuristic that involves a dynamic exchange of ideas between author and audience within a discourse community. A consequence of the author-audience interaction is the evolution and growth of an author's abilities to empathize with the audience, to consider different viewpoints, and to negotiate opposing views. With increased abilities, an author has an opportunity to develop an in-depth understanding of an audience's intellectual, emotional, and moral values. The study is a response to positivism's impact on the contemporary cognitive interpretation of Aristotle's enthymeme as an expression of argument. A positivistic interpretation of an enthymeme is too narrow to capture the social aspects of argumentation. Criticisms challenge the claim that the enthymeme has only one function in composition as a prescriptive formula for writing argumentation. Support for a social perspective of an enthymeme comes from a wide variety of disciplines including rhetoric, philosophy, psychology, and composition research