ABSTRACT
James J. Murphy is a distinguished teacher, scholar, and publisher. A prominent scholar in the field of rhetoric, Murphy has published extensively on the history of rhetoric in the ancient, medieval, and Renaissance periods, as well as the history of language and writing pedagogies. Though his primary focus has been on classical rhetoric, Murphy also writes and lectures on the relation of rhetoric to composition and composition pedagogy. In Quintilian on the Teaching of Speaking and Writing (1987, 2015), Murphy demonstrates the ways that “the master teacher of Rome” employed methods that echo and support modern theory. As editor of A Short History of Writing Instruction from Ancient Greece to Modern America (1995, 2013), Murphy contributes cogent and insightful essays on the ways that rhetorical tradition has shaped and influenced current pedagogy and scholarship.
