Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue: From the Art of Discourse to the Art of Reason [Paperback]

Walter J. Ong S.J. (Author), Adrian Johns (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 27, 2005 | ISBN-10: 0226629767 | ISBN-13: 978-0226629766

Renaissance logician, philosopher, humanist, and teacher, Peter Ramus (1515-72) is best known for his attack on Aristotelian logic, his radical pedagogical theories, and his new interpretation for the canon of rhetoric. His work, published in Latin and translated into many languages, has influenced the study of Renaissance literature, rhetoric, education, logic, and—more recently—media studies.

Considered the most important work of Walter Ong's career, Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue is an elegant review of the history of Ramist scholarship and Ramus's quarrels with Aristotle. A key influence on Marshall McLuhan, with whom Ong enjoys the status of honorary guru among technophiles, this challenging study remains the most detailed account of Ramus's method ever published. Out of print for more than a decade, this book—with a new foreword by Adrian Johns—is a canonical text for enthusiasts of media, Renaissance literature, and intellectual history.

(19611201)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Ong''s elucidation of Ramism as a significant segment of the history of logic is by far the most complete, most searching, most convincing that has been written. In particular, his account of the internal history of Ramist dialectic is an amazing and valuable piece of scholarship. . . . So fundamental is Father Ong''s achievement, that not only scholars of Ramus and Ramism, but anyone with the lightest interest in the Renaissance as a whole, and especially in the histories of science and logic of this period, should turn, and return, to this work to obtain considerable enlightenment about a segment of intellectual history that has too long remained confused and obscure."

(John E. Murdoch Isis )

"This careful book succeeds in correcting and expanding our knowledge of the thought and works of Ramus through a patient examination and rigid reconsideration of the source materials, old and new."

(French Review )

"Indispensable for any scholar interested in Ramus and his influence. But beyond that [it makes] an important contribution to the continuing attempt to find out where the modern mind came from."

(T. K. Scott Jr. Journal of Philosophy )

About the Author

Walter J. Ong, SJ (1912-2003) was professor at St. Louis University and an internationally renowned scholar of rhetorical theory and history. He is the author of numerous books, including In the Human Grain: Further Explorations of Contemporary Culture and Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word.

Product Details

• Paperback: 436 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press (January 27, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226629767
• ISBN-13: 978-0226629766
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #609,551 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Walter Ong on Ramus is still required reading, April 10, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Ramus: Method, and the Decay of Dialogue, from the Art of Discourse to the Art of Reason, (Textbook Binding)

A review of Walter Ong's famous study, Ramus, method, and the Decay of Dialogue, may seem odd now more than fourty years after the book first appeared (1958, republished 1983). Back then it was more than positively received by great renaissance scholars like Wilbur S. Howell, R.R. Bolger, Neal W. Gilbert, John E. Murdoch and others. Murdoch wrote that "anyone with the slightest interest in the Renaissance should turn, and return, to this work". The book not only gives a rich introduction to Ramus the man and his work, but also relates Ramus' writings and the socalled "ramistic movement" which it effectuated to its wider historical and intellectual context, or rather contexts: the pedagogical traditions of the West, medieval scholasticism, the dialectic of Rudolph Agricola and so forth. Ongs discussion of ramism in the light of orality/literacy-themes connected to the use of printing technology, makes the book seem strikingly modern. Certainly, the book has been turned and returned to. However, Ong's study is perhaps still in need of recommendation. It is an eloquent book, but it is not easily read. It has been criticised by scholars on renaissance rhetoric (Monfasani, Fumaroli) and/or ramism (Bruyère, Meerhoff), sometimes justly so, sometimes on the basis of a misreading or a less than kind interpretation of what the author says. Brian Vickers in his excellent and influential In Defence of Rhetoric (1988) almost gives us the impression that the book has actually been outdistanced by its critics - which it certainly has not. Even if Ong's views on spesific points have been refined (for instance by Kees Meerhoff in his discussion of ramist teachings on rhetorical figures in Ramus, Du Bellay et les autres, 1986), his voluminous study also contains insights as well as information which will be found nowhere else. To refer it would require more than thousand words. I recommend every student of rhetoric, early modern philosophy and renaissance culture to get hold of the book, and read it. I recommend the publisher to republish it. It is still wanted.