ABSTRACT
Serious work in global comparative rhetoric requires that we examine the very foundations of our current epistemology in order to generate comparisons that are grounded in accurate historical, cultural, and material contexts. This work is of special importance when dealing with intellectual and rhetorical traditions thus far understudied or denied. This chapter contrasts the environmental exigencies and cosmological roots of Ma’at, the precolonial Pan-African speech ideal, and the Socratic dialectic in order to put them in conversation with one another as classical approaches to ethical rhetoric. Some takeaways from the present analysis are that: (1) while the classical Greek approach to rhetoric is about persuasion and recollection, Ma’at is about communicative human integration with the cosmos and earning a desired place in the astral life (afterlife); (2) while Ma’atian speech is focused on the use of speech and silence to secure one’s future in the afterlife, the Socratic method (Maieutic artistry) aims to help citizens remember the knowledge they possessed before they were born in order to help them fulfill their role in the social order; (3) Ma’at’s end goal is to achieve “Maa kheru” (True of Voice) status in the afterlife while the Socratic method aims at accessing one’s pre-existence; (4) Ma’at prioritizes listening as the foundational rhetorical skill while the dialectic maintains a focus on speech. As scholarship on rhetorical listening continues to grow, there has never been a better time to finally give Ma’at and “communicative solidarity” their rightful place in the canon of ancient rhetoric.
