What we’re about
The East Bay Consortium is my attempt to address what I consider a lack of community-based reading groups that take as their objects of study scholarly texts from across the humanities and social sciences.
As this group's title suggests, readings will draw primarily on texts in rhetorical and critical theories. Aiming to move beyond the categorical knowledge domains of any one discipline, readings will be interdisciplinary in nature, engaging problems, frameworks, and questions that cut across seemingly bounded fields of academic inquiry. In this light, although paradigms in rhetoric and critical theory will form the basis of discussion—including texts from ancient rhetoric, continental philosophy, and more critical approaches (e.g., feminist, political, and post-colonial schools of thought)—these texts are a starting point. With the hope that interest will evolve and expand over time, our group's ethic will take shape as an open investigation that sees fields of study as fluid, reciprocal, and motivated by mutually shared values.
Following this ethic, texts will range from various intellectual traditions—both foundational and contemporary—and include: theories in reading and interpretation, novel studies and narrative, philosophies of science, science and technology studies (STS), and semiotics, to name a few. We will pay particular attention to texts that take up the question of what it means to be human in our rapidly changing world. This question and the possibilities for scholarly thought it generates will serve as the Consortium’s intellectual through-line.
While our emphasis will be on scholarly texts, blogs, trade journals, novels, news articles—even posts from social media—will be equally important to the discussion. Indeed, a central focus of the Consortium is to put pressure on the expectations of genre.
Consider this description a living document—malleable and ever-changing in response to member interests. For now, the Consortium is in its infancy; details related to our configuration are still forming. My hope is to generate enough interest to determine a meeting schedule, format (virtual, in-person, hybrid), method of communication, and discussion style based on member feedback. I imagine that, with at least a few people interested, we can begin ironing out these details and gain ground. Ideally, over time, the group's "digital home" will transition from this website to more self-reliant means.
I look forward to the generative thought that lie ahead!
Max
