Degree Type

Honors Capstone Project

Date of Submission

Spring 5-1-2010

Capstone Advisor

Dr. Anne Demo

Honors Reader

Dr. Elizabeth Fowler

Capstone Major

Communication and Rhetorical Studies

Capstone College

Visual and Performing Arts

Audio/Visual Component

no

Capstone Prize Winner

no

Won Capstone Funding

no

Honors Categories

Humanities

Subject Categories

Communication | Critical and Cultural Studies

Abstract

Studies of the manifesto genre are often based on an understanding of early political manifestos as exemplifying extreme left-wing political philosophies and argument typologies and utilizing the confrontational form. Many avant-garde artistic movements of the early twentieth century wrote manifestos to advocate for new approaches to art, design, and aesthetic education and production. Because there is a gap in present scholarship, these avant-garde art manifestos were incorrectly categorized under the preceded format of early political manifestos. This essay offers the argument that these early twentieth century avant-garde art manifestos actually lie across a spectrum (Rossiter’s Political Spectrum) and can exemplify either left-wing or right-wing political philosophies or argument typologies and can employ either the confrontational or managerial form.

F. T. Marinetti’s 1909 “The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism” and Walter Gropius’ 1919 Bauhaus Manifesto are explicitly analyzed in this essay and represent the two extremes of Rossiter’s Political Spectrum. This essay will add to both rhetorical studies and art historical studies scholarship with its new approach to the rhetorical understanding and framing of these avant-garde art manifestos.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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