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THE PERILS OF RHETORICAL CRITICISM LOREN D. REID University of Missouri THE last twenty years have noted sev- famous women and of twenty-eight out- eral events of importance to those in- terested in the study of public address. The year 1925 saw the publication of the Studies in Rhetoric and Public Speaking in Honor of James A. Winans; 1928 saw the first doctorates in rhetoric and public speaking, the beginning of a group of studies which by 1943 had reached a total of more than fifty, awarded by eight dif- ferent graduate schools; 1939 saw the publication of Thonssen and Fatherson's Bibliography of Speech Education, with its more than 200 pages of entries in rhetoric and public speaking. Last year brought A History and Criticism of American Public Address, with its studies of the speech backgrounds of the Colo- nial, Early National, and Later National periods; of special topics like the teach- ing of rhetoric and the speaking of Columbia, Cornell, Iowa, Louisiana State Uni- versity. Michigan, Northwestern, Southern California, Wisconsin. (From data reported annually by Franklin D. Knower in Speech Monographs.) standing American speakers.2 The Octo- ber, 1943, issue of the QUARTERLY JOUR- NAL OF SPEECH, which announced and reviewed these two volumes, also con- tained articles on research in American public speaking by Dickey," Baird, and Aly. Committees on contemporary and on regional public address have already begun work. Perhaps now is a good time to look over what has been done, and to make certain observations, chiefly to draw from the practice of the last twenty years prin- ciples which may be useful during the next twenty. I Any concept of criticism is unfolded Two volumes (1943), published under the auspices of the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF TEACHERS OF SPEECH. Dallas C. Dickey, "What Directions Should Fu- ture Research in American Public Address Take?", pp. 300-304. A. Craig Baird, "Opportunities for Research in State and Sectional Public Speaking," pp. 304-308. Bower Aly, "The History of American Public Address as a Research Field," pp. 308-314-