Promoting progress : a rhetorical analysis of college and university sexual harassment codes

• Main Author: Porrovecchio, Mark J.
• Other Authors: Knapp, Trischa
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2012
• Subjects: Rice University > Administration; Oregon State University > Administration; Sexual harassment in universities and colleges > Texas > Houston; Sexual harassment in universities and colleges > Oregon > Corvallis; College discipline > Texas > Houston; College discipline > Oregon > Corvallis
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1957/34265

This thesis is a rhetorical analysis of sexual harassment codes on college and university campuses. The situational model proposed by Lloyd Bitzer is used to examine representative artifacts from Rice University in Houston, Texas, and Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon, so as to determine whether they operate as "fitting" rhetorical responses to the situation generally and the exigence of sexual harassment specifically. The body of this analysis develops in eight stages: an introductory discussion of sexual harassment and research conducted thereon; examination of codes as ethical and situational constructs; explication of the rhetorical framework; the nature of the exigence as a historical and campus-specific imperfection; examination of the publics that create the rhetorical audience; the inartistic and artistic constraints operative within the rhetorical situation; an analysis of the two codes; and summary comments and recommendations. Within the last two sections the determinations are made that: 1) the codes do not currently function as a "fitting" response to the situation/exigence, and that 2) revisions can be made so as to promote a more pragmatic and "fitting" response to sexual harassment. === Graduation date: 1997