ABOUT THIS BOOK

Charles Willard's provocative Argumentation and the Social Grounds of Knowledge is not a celebration of controversy but a sophisticated study that explores the social basis of human knowledge. Drawing upon phenomenologists such as Alfred Schultz, psychologists such as George Kelley, and argumentation philosophers such as Stephen Toulmin, Willard makes a genuine contribution to intellectual inquiry by extending essential consideration about human knowledge. He insightfully demonstrates how "secular sources" provide a fundamental resource in developing religious understanding from argumentative interactions.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Charles Arthur Willard (born 1945) is an American argumentation and rhetorical theorist. He is Professor and University Scholar at the University of Louisville, Kentucky.

REVIEWS

"[An] important book. . . . Indeed, revolutionary." —Jahrbuch Rhetorik

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"Highly insightful and intellectually refreshing . . . Argumentation and the Social Grounds of Knowledge provides thought-provoking reading for humanists concerned with rational inquiry, communication theory, religious philosophy, and liberal education." —Religious Humanism

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"A departure from the traditional orientation that conceived of argumentation as applied logic. . . . [This book] exhibit[s] a concern for the social knowledge generated by a practice of communication in real situations[,] provide[s] suggestions for interpreting interactions in which incompatible ideas come into conflict, and attempt[s] to explain how human beings thus come to know." —Philosophy and Rhetoric

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

Preface

Introduction

1.
The Nature of Argumentation

2.
Argumentation and Rationality

3.
The Nature of Argument Fields

4.
Criticism: The Epistemics of Argument and the Argument of Epistemics

Notes

References

Index