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Rhetoric in Benedictine monastic schools: Composition in the Richardton (ND) Abbey School, 1900-1936
Abstract
A commitment to classical education and an adaptability to local conditions are the two patterns evident in the teaching of composition and in the selection of composition/rhetoric textbooks at the Richardton (ND) Abbey School. These patterns reflect the teaching of rhetoric at Benedictine monastic schools down through the centuries. The two characteristics of conservatism and adaptability that mark the Benedictine Order, and through it the Benedictine monastic schools, are manifested in the teaching of composition/rhetoric at the Richardton Abbey School. While adhering to the tradition of a classical education, the Abbey School, and other monastic schools, modified that tradition to meet the needs of the time and the place. As might be expected, the teaching and selection of texts at the school also depended on what was available, on contemporary rhetorical and compositional theory, insofar as it reached Richardton, and on contemporary textbooks. Chapter Two demonstrated the influence of the characteristics of conservatism and adaptability on the teaching of rhetoric in the monastic schools from 500 to 1900 as background for the discussion of the teaching of composition/rhetoric at the Abbey School from 1900 to 1936. Chapter Three traces the history of the Abbey School, focusing on the various local factors (the character of the school's founder, the fluidity of the faculty, special needs of the students) that affected the teaching of composition/rhetoric at the school. Chapter Four connects some contemporary rhetorical theories and practices to their influence on the texts used at the school, since it was primarily through these books that current rhetorical theory and practice reached the school. Chapter Five examines the composition/rhetoric textbooks used at the school and the specific local factors which influenced the selection of these books and indicates how the Benedictine characteristics of conservatism and adaptability influenced the patterns that emerge in textbook selection and in composition teaching at the Richardton Abbey School from 1900 to 1936.
Subject Area
Education history|Language arts|Language
Recommended Citation
Fournier, Denis Richard, "Rhetoric in Benedictine monastic schools: Composition in the Richardton (ND) Abbey School, 1900-1936" (1989). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9019564.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9019564