Erik Gunderson

The Ideology of the Arena

The Roman arena is often described as an exotic or peripheral institution. Alternatively, it has been seen as a culturally central institution. In this case one traditionally assumes either that the arena is used to pacify the lower classes or that it expresses themes of violence at the heart of Roman society. In the first view the arena9s politics are cynical; in the second they are often described as decadent or full of despair. While none of these readings should be neglected, this essay argues that the arena can be examined as a productive institution which helps in the maintenance of Roman social relations from the top to the bottom and from the violent to the banal. When viewed in the light of Louis Althusser9s idea of the ideological state apparatus, the arena can be read as political and psychological without recourse to notions of cunning calculation or psychic crisis. The arena is not only normal, but it participates in the production of normativity. This study pays particular attention to the ways in which the arena enables a specific kind of vision of the Roman world. In this vision the Roman nobiles in general and, later, the emperor in particular are reaffirmed as legitimate authorities: the rulers perhaps need the arena more than does the mob. The arena is also a locus at which the relations of domination which subsist between Rome and its subjects and between the sexes are reproduced in both the social and theatrical senses: the arena stages culturally vital spectacles. Indeed the export of the arena into the Roman provinces also entails the exportation of the Roman social structures which the arena serves. The Romanness of the arena is in fact so pervasive that even many of the hostile appraisals of the arena which come to us from antiquity reproduce the hierarchical social vision which the arena enables even as the institution itself is repudiated. Accordingly all representations of the arena need to be read within the logic of the arena itself. The ideology of the arena has no outside.

The rhetoric of rhetorical theory

Theories regularly enjoy a specific rhetorical advantage: their audience generally comes to them pre-persuaded that theoretical accounts are authoritative and that well-articulated theory has a masterful tale to tell about practice. For a writer of an overview of a subject, this disposition makes for lighter labors. Neutral, factual, true: an objective account of practice persuades us that theory itself is to be trusted. It is clear, though, that I am here to put you on your guard, even at my own expense as the authoritative authority. For I am here to persuade you that theory persuades. Specifically, there is no such thing as “The theory of rhetoric.” Instead there are various performances that have been labeled by their authors as “The theory of rhetoric.” And these performances, to the extent that they are effective, yield a conviction on the part of their audience that the theory they encounter is “The Theory,” that the author of this theory is an authority, and, most importantly, that the prestigious, potent, and culturally contested domain of rhetorical practice has been fully compassed by it. If we look at Quintilian’s Institutes we will find a text that is explicitly rhetorical. The contents of the arguments are exemplified by the form in which they are presented. It is, then, important to read the Institutio Oratoria as a rhetorical performance if we are to appreciate the message of the Institutes itself. As a rhetorical performance the Institutes betrays traits of deliberative, forensic, and display oratory since it not only concerns itself with the expedient, the just, and the noble but even attempts to unite them.

Types of oratory

Aristotle’s Rhetoric is our first surviving work to divide oratory into three types ( eidē ) or species ( genē ): “deliberative” ( sumbouleutikon ); “forensic” or “dicanic” ( dikanikon ); “epideictic” or “display” or “demonstrative” ( epideiktikon ). This threefold classification is an important structuring principle in the philosopher’s attempt to establish that rhetoric is a proper “art” (tekhnē). Aristotle’s vision of rhetoric is that it be a practical discourse; an important counterpart to philosophical dialectic in a real-world setting where a speaker is seeking the best available means of persuasion in the face of mass audiences (Aristotle, Rhetoric 1358a36-b8). Aristotle explains that there are three types of rhetorikē because there are three kinds of “hearers” of speeches (1358a37–b6): epideictic oratory is directed at the spectator (theōros), who judges the ability of the speaker. The hearer of forensic oratory judges things that have already happened while the “deliberative” hearer is a judge of things to come. Aristotle goes on to give each of the three types a distinctive mode: deliberative oratory is either hortatory or dissuasive. Forensic oratory is either accusatory or defensive. Epideictic oratory offers either praise or blame (1358b8–13). In line with the remarks on “judgment” the three types also treat different aspects of time (1358b14–19). But when it comes to epideictic oratory, Aristotle’s penchant for tidiness comes under strain: while he deals primarily with matters of the present, the display orator might also recall past events or anticipate the future.