Honey I Shrunk the Ethos

A certain number of my fellow composition teachers have a real problem with what they call “qualifying statements.” These are are things like saying “in my opinion,” and “I would argue,” or the ever popular “I think.” My comrades often complain: don’t tell me that you would say or argue something, just do it. Any kind of qualifying statement, my co-workers would argue, detracts from the argument, the all-important argument that is the mainstay of academic writing.

I believe they have a good point. However, I am also reminded of a quote from Aristotle: “for it is not the case, as some of the handbook writers propose in their treatment of the art, that fair-mindedness [epieikeia] on the part of the speaker makes no contribution to persuasiveness; rather, character is almost, so to speak, the most authoritative form of persuasion” (Rhetoric Book I chapter 2). In George Kennedy’s notes to his translation of this passage of the Rhetoric, he says, “Why would they say this? possibly it was thought to weaken a speaker’s position if at the begining of a speech he showed himself as too mild rather than took an uncompromising position or demonstrated outrage.”

Are we missing what Aristotle saw as “the most Authoritative form of persuasion”? Students are almost universally admonished to completely eliminate their own character from their academic writing. The most obvious example of this is the more-or-less standard rule that students should never use “I” in an academic essay. But I believe that the eradication of the student writer’s self goes somewhat deeper than that.

My own personal experience has taught me that there is a significant element of college composition teachers that want their students to completely eliminate their ethos from their essays. This is understandable; students tend to be younger than us. They tend to be less educated. They tend to have less well-formed ideas about the things we think are important.

I worry that this last reason might be the impetus behind the school of thought that tells students to remove themselves from their own writing. Granted, students shouldn’t be writing personal narratives as academic essays, but I really wonder, and I would love to hear from you all, if we are in danger of overlooking the ethos that Aristotle found so important.