Nomos initially meant “pasture,” eventually evolving as habitation then, “habitual practice, usage, or custom.”[1] Nomos again evolved into something people “believed in, practiced or held to be right.” This definition is applicable to rhetoric because it’s a process of communicating culturally constructed beliefs, and is an argument for replacing Truth with socially constructed contextual “truth.”[2] Nomos’ implied relativity and spelling reminded me of the Afrocentric term nommo, the generative power of the spoken word. I initially thought Molefi Asanti reconfigured nomos Afrocentrically; however, after researching nommo I developed another hypothesis.
Nommo originates from the Dogon people of
Nommo’s creative element reflects Jarratt’s definition: “Nomos in its most comprehensive meaning stands for order, valid and binding on those who fall under its jurisdiction.”[6] Both generate “truth” socially through language. However, unlike the secular Sophistic nomos as a logic, nommo and spirituality/god are inextricable, it is “magic power”[7]. Thus nommo is also inextricable from African culture despite its relativism. This combined with the Sophist’s extensive travels and multicultural experience led me to postulate nommo came first, and through their travels, the Sophists discovered nommo, translated the concept into their secular logic, adapting nommo to their, for lack of a better term, nomos. Obviously I cannot test this hypothesis[8] here, but I predict our incomplete and Eurocentric record of the Sophists and Western philosophy would not be conclusive.
[1] Susan C. Jarratt’s Rereading the Sophists: Classical Rhetoric Refigured p. 41
[2] Jarratt p. 42
[3] From Maulana Karenga’s essay “Nommo, Kawaida, and Communicative Practice: Bringing Good into the World” in the book Understanding African American Rhetoric: Classical Origins to Contemporary Innovations edited by Ronald L. Jackson II and Elaine B. Richardson. (p. 8)
[4] Molefi Kete Asante’s book The Afrocentric Idea 1997 p. 95
[5] Karenga p. 9
[6] Jarratt p. 60
[7] William Handley’s article, “The House a Ghoast Built: “Nommo,” Allegory, and the Ethics of Reading in Toni Morrison’s ‘Beloved’” from Contemporary Literature 1995 p. 677
[8] Ironic use of the scientific method!!!!!11
2 comments:
Megan Harlow
The employment of nomos by modern rhetorical scholars can provide empowering forms for analysis such as Stephanie points out related to marginalized or oppressed groups. Jarrett writes that Nomos focus on contextual truth, "provides a useful alternative to the attempt to discover marginalized voices marked by characteristic stylistic feature" (Jarrett 75). She goes on to speak about how women have been silenced from Western discourse, but arguably so have racial 'others'. For instance in the dominant narrative of America there are two counternarratives that can challenge the foundations of its employment. Narratives of Native American genocide, and black slavery both exist as counter-narratives which challenges the Truth. Richard Delgado writes of the power of narrative, "The dominant group
justifies its privileged position by means of stories, stock explanations
that construct reality in ways favorable to it." Thus the US creates a story that is universalized through logos of a promised land, a group of oppressed people leaving their homes to create a melting pot full of righteousness, liberty, justice and equality for all. Counter narratives reveal that this was not true, Native American's and blacks were not considered a part of this vision of human equality, neither were poor people or women.
These counter narratives highlight the importance of nomos as a lens to examine history and rhetoric so that we can not accept a monolithic notion of history as Jasper Neel writes, Western thought can play itself out as a history in which truth, after much tribulation, triumphs through its own self-righteous virtue and then remains available in the West forever". Encouraging students to examine today's dominant narrative that includes how the US is now free, unprejudice, and equal through exploring counter narratives which may lie in alternate sources (hip hop, street voices is a pedagological tool with the idea that, "the classroom can open a space for the kinds of "negotiation, innovation, and the exploration of
political views" as Pough writes in 2002 about the use of Black Panthers Papers in the classroom. This type of classroom would focus on empowerment where students become active in their public sphere.
Feb., 2002 D. Pough (Assistant Professor of Women's Studies at the University of Minnesota,) Empowering Rhetoric: Black Students Writing Black Panthers Gwendolyn College Composition and Communication, Vol. 53, No. 3.)
Susan Jarrett Rereading The Sophist: Classical Rhetoric Refigured 1991 Southern Illinois University
Richard Delgado Storytelling for Oppositionists and Others: A Plea for Narrative. Michigan Law Review, Vol. 87, No. 8, Legal Storytelling. (Aug., 1989), pp. 2411-2441 http://www.jstor.org/cgi-bin/jstor/printpage/00262234/ap040687/04a00110/0.pdf?backcontext=page&dowhat=Acrobat&config=jstor&userID=8182668a@ksu.edu/01c0a848640050d60c9&0.pdf
I thought we had flogged the dead horse that was nomos, but you brought a really fresh perspective to it. The creative power of the spoken word is celebrated in Hebrew and Greek traditions as well - the story of Jacob and Esau and the celebration of name-days respectively. I have to question two of your choices however. By saying that nomos "generates" truth - are you claiming it as epistemic? Or are you saying that as nomos "names" truths already accepted that the process of naming it is therefore creating the truth? Secondly - which definition of logos were you intending? I can get my head around "nomos as a logos" if you meant it as "universal mind" but not as "a logic".
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