Techne, from Neoclassicism to Postmodernism

Kelly Pender"s final provocative suggestion-that it is precisely through the apparent opposition between "closed" and "open" that writing itself has been marginalized within the writing classroom-is an extraordinarily insightful point, one that deserves serious consideration within the rhetoric and composition community. -John Muckelbauer, author of Invention and the Future: Rhetoric, Postmodernism, and the Problem of Change The word techne has no equivalent in English and so is usually understood as one of the three terms that approximate its original Greek meaning: art, skill, craft. As a kind of productive knowledge, techne is often defined by its close association with rationality and instrumentality. TECHNE, FROM NEOCLASSICISM TO POSTMODERNISM: UNDERSTANDING WRITING AS A USEFUL, TEACHABLE ART is a book about the relationships among the many meanings of this complex term. Kelly Pender tells the story of techne"s presence in the development of rhetoric and composition as an...