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Judicial Rhapsodies: Rhetoric and Fundamental Rights in the Supreme Court
Doug CoulsonFirst examining the classical origins of divisions between law and rhetoric, Coulson tracks what he calls an epideictic register—highly affective forms of expression that utilize hyperbole, amplification, and vocabularies of praise—through a surprising number of landmark Supreme Court opinions. Judicial Rhapsodies recovers and revalues these instances as significant to establishing and maintaining shared perspectives that form the basis for common experience and cooperation.
Doug Coulson is an associate professor of English at Carnegie Mellon University, where he teaches in the areas of legal rhetoric, argument, and the history of rhetoric. Before entering academia, he practiced business and commercial litigation for nearly a decade. He is the author of Race, Nation, and Refuge: The Rhetoric of Race in Asian American Citizenship Cases (SUNY), and his articles on legal rhetoric and writing have appeared in many journals, including Rhetorica, the Scribes Journal of Legal Writing, and the Yale Journal of Law and the Humanities.

- 978-1-943208-46-3 (paper)
- 978-1-943208-47-0 (open access)