Editing Rhetoric (section)

===Methods of analysis===

====Criticism seen as a method====
Rhetoric can be analyzed by a variety of methods and theories. One such method is criticism. When those using criticism analyze instances of rhetoric what they do is called rhetorical criticism {{See below|[[#Criticism|Criticism]]}}. According to rhetorical critic [[Jim A. Kuypers]], "The use of rhetoric is an art, and as such, it does not lend itself well to scientific methods of analysis. Criticism is an art as well, and as such is particularly well suited for examining rhetorical creations."<ref name="Jim A 2009">{{cite book|first=Jim A.|last=Kuypers|chapter=Rhetorical Criticism as Art|title=Rhetorical Criticism: Perspectives in Action|editor-first=Jim A.|editor-last=Kuypers|location=Lanham, Md.|publisher=[[Lexington Books]]|year=2009|isbn=978-0-7391-2774-2}}</ref>{{rp|14}} He asserts that criticism is a method of generating knowledge just as the scientific method is a method for generating knowledge:<ref name="Jim A 2009"/> 
{{Blockquote
|text=The way the Sciences and the Humanities study the phenomena that surround us differ greatly in the amount of researcher personality allowed to influence the results of the study. For example, in the Sciences researchers purposefully adhere to a {{em|strict}} method (the scientific method).... Generally speaking, the researcher's personality, likes and dislikes, and religious and political preferences are supposed to be as far removed as possible from the actual study....<br /><br />In sharp contrast, criticism (one of many Humanistic methods of generating knowledge) actively involves the personality of the researcher. The very choices of what to study, and how and why to study a rhetorical artifact are heavily influenced by the personal qualities of the researcher.... In the Humanities, methods of research may also take many forms—criticism, ethnography, for example—but the personality of the researcher is an integral component of the study. Further personalizing criticism, we find that rhetorical critics use a variety of means when examining a particular rhetorical artifact, with some critics even developing their own unique perspective to better examine a rhetorical artifact.{{r|Jim A 2009|page=14}}
|author=Jim A. Kuypers}}

[[Edwin Black (rhetorician)|Edwin Black]] wrote on this point that, "Methods, then, admit of varying degrees of personality. And criticism, on the whole, is near the indeterminate, contingent, personal end of the methodological scale. In consequence of this placement, it is neither possible nor desirable for criticism to be fixed into a system, for critical techniques to be objectified, for critics to be interchangeable for purposes of replication, or for rhetorical criticism to serve as the handmaiden of quasi-scientific theory."<ref name=Black1978>{{cite book|author-link=Edwin Black (rhetorician)|first=Edwin|last=Black|title=Rhetorical Criticism: A Study in Method|location=Madison, Wisc.|publisher=[[University of Wisconsin Press]]|year=1978|orig-date=1965|isbn=0-299-07550-8}}</ref>{{rp|xi}}

Jim A. Kuypers sums this idea of criticism as art in the following manner: "In short, criticism is an art, not a science. It is not a scientific method; it uses subjective methods of argument; it exists on its own, not in conjunction with other methods of generating knowledge (i.e., social scientific or scientific)... [I]nsight and imagination top statistical applications when studying rhetorical action."{{r|Jim A 2009|page=14–15}}