A Word with a Mission: How Parrhesia Moves and Reproduces

While moments of risky resistance are important in and of themselves, a networked rhetorical theory of parrhesia also focuses on how these moments are interconnected, influencing additional resistance across time and place. One way that parrhesia continues to affect the social domain after the parrhesiastic moment has passed is through circulation and distribution; thus, it is crucial to understand the relationship of technology in spreading parrhesiastic messages. Parrhesia also occurs in both the public and private realms and over time has shifted between these domains and is an activity that can bring the private into the public in impactful ways. Parrhesia has also had a long, complicated history with rhetoric, at times viewed as solidly within the purview of rhetoric and at other times posited as antithetical to it. The history of how parrhesia moves, spreads, and is understood forms the foundation of the rhetorical, networked theory proposed by this work.