{{Short description|Exercise in rhetoric}} {{for|the album|Controversia (album)}} {{italic title}} [[File:Seneka Starszy Sevilla cropped.JPG|thumb|right|Seneca the Elder compiled a study of the classic themes in his ten volumes of ''Controversiæ''.]] {{Rhetoric}}
A '''''controversia''''' is an exercise in rhetoric; a form of declamation in which the student speaks for one side in a notional legal case such as treason or poisoning. The facts of the matter and relevant law are presented in a persuasive manner, in the style of a legal counsel.<ref>{{citation |pages=500–501 |title=Handbook of Literary Rhetoric |author=Heinrich Lausberg, translated by David E. Orton |publisher=BRILL |year=1998 |isbn=9789004107052}}</ref>
==History== Like ''thesis'' and ''suasoria'', ''controversia'' originated in ancient Greece.<ref name=":3">{{Cite book|title=Seneca the Elder|last=Fairweather|first=Janet|date=2007-11-29|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=9780521231015|location=Cambridge|pages=[https://archive.org/details/senecaelder0000fair/page/104 104]|url=https://archive.org/details/senecaelder0000fair/page/104}}</ref> It was a rhetorical exercise and is associated with the history of Greek education.<ref name=":3" /> An early form of the Roman ''controversia'' was described by Seneca as a combination of thesis (''propositio'') and hypothesis (''causa'').<ref name=":4" /> The former pertained to the general topic being proposed for discussion from one or more points of view without delimitation of particular persons or circumstances. On the other hand, hypothesis refers to the particular controversy given by circumstances to a deliberating body for adjudication.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book|title=Muses of One Mind: The Literary Analysis of Experience and Its Continuity|last=Trimpi|first=Wesley|publisher=Wipf and Stock Publishers|year=2009|isbn=9781608991556|location=Eugene, Oregon|pages=307|language=en}}</ref> Based on an example of the exercise cited in Cicero's ''De oratore'', it is cited that ''controversia'' emerged at least during 55 BCE, the date of ''De oratore''<nowiki/>'s composition.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|title=The Oxford Handbook of Rhetorical Studies|last=MacDonald|first=Michael J.|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2017|isbn=9780190681845|location=New York|pages=167}}</ref>
The exercise was used in ancient Rome, where it was, with the ''suasoria'', the final stage of a course in rhetoric at an academy.<ref>{{cite book|chapter=Declamation and contestation in satire |author=Susanna Morton Braund |author-link=Susanna Braund |page=148 |title = Roman Eloquence: Rhetoric in Society and Literature |publisher=Routledge |year=1997 |isbn=9780415125444}}</ref> ''Controversia'' and ''suasoria'' provided students the best window into the play-speech of schooling and declamatory performance that formed the basis of ancient rhetorical mentality.<ref name=":2" /> As a form of disputation, it consists of a statement of one or more laws, which was followed by the circumstances of a fictitious case in which the speaker argued one side or the other.<ref name=":1" />
While ''suasoria'' required students to persuade a person (e.g., judge) or a group (e.g., jury) to act a certain way, ''controversia'' required a student to either prosecute or defend a person in a given legal case.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Composition and the Rhetoric of Science: Engaging the Dominant Discourse|last=Zerbe|first=Michael|publisher=Southern Illinois University Press|year=2007|isbn=9780809327409|pages=35}}</ref> The ''controversia'' is also distinguished from ''suasoria'' because of the complexity of its structural system of argument and the greater range of situations and characters employed.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book|title=Encyclopedia of Rhetoric, Volume 1|last=Sloane|first=Thomas|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2001|isbn=9780195125955|location=Oxford|pages=168–169}}</ref> The distinction can also be explained in the way students who focused on this exercise ended up as forensic orators while those who trained in ''suasoria'' followed a career in deliberative rhetoric.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Philo and Paul Among the Sophists|last=Winter|first=Bruce|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1997|isbn=0521591082|location=Cambridge|pages=31}}</ref> The process put students in the position of one offering reasoned advice and, as a result, earning experience in the application of the procedure of deliberative theory.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bonner |first=Stanley F. |title=Education in Ancient Rome: From the Elder Cato to the Younger Pliny |publisher=Univ of California Press |year=1977 |isbn=0-520-03439-2 |location=Los Angeles, CA |pages=272 |language=en}}</ref>
Seneca the Elder was an expert rhetorician and, from memory, compiled a set of classical themes for this exercise: the ''Controversiæ''.<ref>{{citation |page=276 |title=The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome|volume=1 |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2010 |isbn=9780195170726}}</ref> ''Controversia'' is demonstrated in the case of Quintillian's ''Declamationes Minores'' where ''suasoria'' was turned into this exercise by using a courtroom as a setting.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=A Companion to Roman Rhetoric|last1=Dominik|first1=William|last2=Hall|first2=Jon|publisher=John Wiley & sons|year=2010|isbn=9781405120913|location=Hoboken, NJ|pages=302}}</ref> The plot addressed the issue of a son who married the daughter of his father's enemy so he could use the dowry to ransom his who was captured by pirates.<ref name=":0" /> Quintillian used controversia as an analytical method, which involved a survey of diversity of opinions on a specific topic to identify positions as well as the pros and cons of each side.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Many Sides: A Protagorean Approach to the Theory, Practice and Pedagogy of Argument|last=Mendelson|first=Michael|date=2002|publisher=Kluwer Academic Publishers|isbn=1402004028|location=Dordrecht|pages=184}}</ref> He also introduced the term ''controversia figurata'' (figured speech) to explain an excitement of suspicion for the purpose of indicating that what is meant is other than the words would seem to imply and such “meaning is not, in this case, contrary to that which we express, as in the case of irony, but rather a hidden meaning which is left to the hearer to discover.”<ref>{{Cite book |last=Vegge |first=Ivar |title=2 Corinthians, a Letter about Reconciliation: A Psychagogical, Epistolographical, and Rhetorical Analysis |date=2008 |publisher=Mohr Siebeck |isbn=978-3-16-149302-7 |location=Tubingen, Germany |pages=128–129 |language=en}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist}}
Category:Pedagogy Category:Rhetoric