Aspasia: Discussion Notes for Monday, March 3

The following notes are taken from The Rhetorical Tradition (B/H), Rhetoric Retold by Cheryl Glenn (Glenn) and a book chapter titled “Aspasia: Rhetoric, Gender, and Colonial Ideology” by Susan Jarratt and Rory Ong (J/O). Because there is so little known about Aspasia, and because we only know her vicariously through her contemporaries and historians (we have no known primary texts authored by Aspasia), there is much debate about whom she was, what her contributions were to rhetoric, and in what ways she ignored, diffused, or crossed gender boundaries. These notes, then, form a picture of Aspasia, but they may not be factual. I’ve divided the notes thematically, and have included questions for Monday’s class discussion at the end. I am open to moving the discussion beyond the questions I offer; this is merely a starting point.

Biography

·         Born in Miletus (Asia Minor), daughter of Axiochus (Athenian political figure and aristocrat). Miletus is thought to be the birthplace of Western philosophy where “Milesian philosophers . . . sought to explain the natural world through abstraction and physical law rather than divine agency and anthropomorphic mythical figures” (J/O). While there isn’t any explicit connection to Milesian philosophers, we can assume Aspasia was strongly influenced by their teachings.

·         Born about 470 BCE and died about 400 (note that her birth and death dates closely match Socrates’s)

·         Lived with Pericles (they couldn’t marry because she was a foreigner), which was probably a “unique” (J/O) arrangement in mid-5^th century BCE Athens

·         Mother of Pericles the Younger, who was awarded Athenian citizenship at Pericles’s urging, which is ironic since Pericles initiated Athenian law that only gave citizenship to children of two Athenian parents

·         After Pericles’s death, she married a sheep dealer; her influence led him to later become a political leader

·         She was famous/infamous for her sexual prowess

·         Some believe Diotima, the female teacher in Plato’s Symposium, is a representation of Aspasia

·         Like Socrates and Aristotle, she was charged with impiety, but Pericles fought the charges and she was acquitted

Contributions to Rhetoric

·         Famous teacher of rhetoric who fraternized (yes, I used that word intentionally) with famous 5^th century BCE Athenian philosophers and politicians

·         Some scholars argue she wrote some speeches that have been attributed to Pericles, most notably the funeral oration (which we see unreliable evidence of in Menexenus); and some contend she inspired the Socratic Method

·         Plato associates Aspasia with the sophists; however Aspasia and Plato agree on several primary points; for example, they each taught that belief and truth are not necessarily the same, that rhetoric can obscure truth, and that public rhetoric has political potential (Glenn 43)

·         B/H note that Menexenus could be read multiple ways, including one that has Aspasia testify against her own rhetorical abilities; or one that playfully illustrates Socrates’s deference to her

·         She arrived in Athens, probably age 30, already well educated; she was influenced by and influenced Milesian and Athenian philosophy

·         She valued reflective learning

·         “Aspasia treats her interlocutors as her intellectual equals, not attempting to knock them down with agonistic argument but rather gently drawing them toward her own point of view by means of premises they provide and endorse” (B/H 59)

·         Aspasia’s salon was a place for “doing” rhetoric

·         “Aspasia takes each interlocutor through a series of analogous questions, leading each to an embarrassed aporia, an admission of dissatisfaction with his or her spouse.” This method is related to the Socratic method and to Protagoras’s method of questioning, a “practice of generating contradictory propositions (dissoi logoi) on any subject” (J/O).

·         She influenced Cicero; her lesson on induction is the centerpiece for his argumentation chapter in De inventione (see page 64 of B/H for exerpt)

 

Gender Boundaries

·         Pericles’s friends were bothered that she lived with Pericles in the main house rather than in the women’s quarters; they thought this was an affront to gender assignments

·         She probably paid taxes, which was highly unusual for women

·         She often held egalitarian social gatherings in her home; men and women (sometimes the men’s wives) had lively philosophical discussions, rather than having slaves or prostitutes ‘entertain’ the men

·          Best known and most influential of the few women who were able to actively participate in an otherwise oppressive social, academic, and political system; Sappho is as well known, but her contributions were literary

·         Women were either slaves or not slaves (“the word free simply has no meaning here” [J/O]), and their roles were clearly defined and normalized; because Aspasia so notably and publicly stepped beyond her assigned role (not only as a woman, but also a metic), she was despised by the general citizenry of Athens

·         Thucydides writes that Pericles celebrated Aspasia as the ideal woman, even advising her “Your greatest glory is not to be inferior to what God has made you,” which gave Aspasia license to ignore many of the strictures placed on most women.  Compare this to Pericles’s pronouncement about women in general, which was that “The greatest glory of a woman is to be least talked about by men, whether they are praising . . .  or criticizing” (qtd. in Glenn 38).

·         She gave advice to men about rhetoric, yes, but about their personal lives too. Notably, Athenaeus calls her Socrates’s “preceptor in love” and describes how she gave Socrates advice on how to woo Alcibiades, the young man of Socrates’s desire (see “From Deipnosophistae” B/H 65).

 

Questions for Discussion

1. Plato’s Menexenus—which contains Plato’s version of Socrates’s version of Aspasia’s version of Pericles’s funeral oration—suggests Aspasia was a colleague to the great Atheno-androcentric thinkers of 5^th century BCE Athens. To what do you attribute her acceptance into such an elite circle? What evaluation do you give her and her contemporaries for her non-standard inclusion among the great thinkers?

2. Page 61 of B/H has Socrates saying that “even the pupil of very inferior masters….might make a figure if he were to praise Athenians among Athenians”…    Does this suggest that Plato thought Aspasia was an inferior master, but Athenians were attracted to her praise of them? Is Plato suggesting this is how she beguiled Socrates?

3. As Menexenus prods Socrates to share what he overheard Aspasia rehearsing, Socrates says to him, “…you will laugh at me if I continue the games of youth in old age.” What does Plato mean to suggest?

4. What interpretations can we draw from Plato’s rhetorical choice to have a non-Athenian woman articulate the themes of rhetoric and democracy? Is Plato being ironic, satirical, serious, or playful? Do we trust Plato’s interpretation? Do we trust Aspasia’s?

5. By Aspasia’s inclusion in Menexenus and his treatment of her, is Plato expanding or devaluing the possibilities for females/metics in Athenian culture and Western philosophy?