Page 22 - Gabrijela Kišiček and Igor Ž. Žagar (eds.), What do we know about the world? Rhetorical and argumentative perspectives, Digital Library, Educational Research Institute, Ljubljana 2013
P. 22
What Do We Know about the World?
His passion for rhetoric culminated in his work with young enthusiasts
resulting in his ultimate masterpiece – founding of The School of Rheto-
ric with the Department of Phonetics of the Croatian Philological Soci-
ety and the Ministry of Science, Education and Sport of the Republic of
Croatia. The School started amidst the Croatian War for Independence
in 1992 in Mali Lošinj, and Professor Škarić supervised it for 17 years.
His precious work continues to live on under the name: The School of
Rhetoric “Ivo Škarić”. His ideas are revived twice a year through young
secondary school students who are developing critical thinking and are
taught how to face future endeavours by acquiring speaking skills.
He believed that democracy is a spoken culture, and so for youth to
be prepared for life they needed to be good speakers. He relied on log-
os, since the main goal of rhetorical education is rational speaking and
young people should be taught to think argumentatively, focussing on
thinking as a prerequisite for well-structured speaking.
We should always remember the legacy he left to his students – that
critical discourse is passionate and ethical, and not cold (that is, a cun-
ning and deceitful discourse), and that although it is in our nature to un-
derstand the world around us in terms of cause and effect, it does not im-
ply that we should not fight for what is truly important, defendable and
ethical, even when we are aware of the final consequences.
His passion for rhetoric culminated in his work with young enthusiasts
resulting in his ultimate masterpiece – founding of The School of Rheto-
ric with the Department of Phonetics of the Croatian Philological Soci-
ety and the Ministry of Science, Education and Sport of the Republic of
Croatia. The School started amidst the Croatian War for Independence
in 1992 in Mali Lošinj, and Professor Škarić supervised it for 17 years.
His precious work continues to live on under the name: The School of
Rhetoric “Ivo Škarić”. His ideas are revived twice a year through young
secondary school students who are developing critical thinking and are
taught how to face future endeavours by acquiring speaking skills.
He believed that democracy is a spoken culture, and so for youth to
be prepared for life they needed to be good speakers. He relied on log-
os, since the main goal of rhetorical education is rational speaking and
young people should be taught to think argumentatively, focussing on
thinking as a prerequisite for well-structured speaking.
We should always remember the legacy he left to his students – that
critical discourse is passionate and ethical, and not cold (that is, a cun-
ning and deceitful discourse), and that although it is in our nature to un-
derstand the world around us in terms of cause and effect, it does not im-
ply that we should not fight for what is truly important, defendable and
ethical, even when we are aware of the final consequences.
