Shane Crombie
LCC International University, Klaipeda, Lithuania, e-mail: scrombie@lcc.lt
Abstract
This article addresses the pedagogical challenge of teaching rhetoric using high-context Medieval texts to contemporary university students accustomed to low-context communication styles, following the definition of Edward. T. Halll. Foundational texts from figures like Hrabanus Maurus, Hugh of St Victor, and John of Salisbury are essential to rhetorical history but remain largely unaccessible to modern readers.
These texts rely heavily on unspoken, implicit, collective intellectual background (Christian theology, classical history, scholastic philosophy). In contrast, modern communication is overwhelmingly low-context. Influenced by digital media, global diversity, and secular education, contemporary students seek explicit, fragmented, and immediate information. The high-context nature of Medieval rhetoric is thus often dismissed as opaque, irrelevant, or simply too demanding of sustained attention and cultural inference.
To bridge this divide, this article proposes a pedagogical framework centered on Martindale, and later Harwick’s development Classical Reception Theory (CRT). Drawing on the work of Gadamer, Jauss and Isner, CRT offers a powerful methodology that deliberately links the student’s horizon of expectation to the historical horizon of the text. This approach avoids training students in historical minutiae; instead, it uses the text as a site for a dialogic encounter leading to a fusion of horizons. The strategy requires instructors to make the difference in context the primary subject of rhetorical analysis—examining what the Medieval author implicitly assumes and why the modern reader requires that assumption to be explicitly unpacked. By implementing this Classical Reception Theory approach, instructors can transform challenging historical texts into dynamic tools for understanding how rhetorical strategy is fundamentally shaped by the cultural and cognitive context of its audience.
Key Words: Classical Reception, Medieval Rhetoric, Pedagogy, Cultural Context
INTRODUCTION
The teaching of rhetoric in mid 9th to the mid 12th Western Europe is well documented as part of developing pedagogical systems. Wide-ranging authors such as Hrabanus Maurus, Hugh of St. Victor and John of Sailsbury, using the liberal arts model include rhetoric as part of their discourse. While each of them tend to conflate eloquence with rhetoric, as part of the classical Trivium rhetoric plays an important part in the pragmatic, and prescriptive, teaching philosophy they have bequeathed. As part of ongoing doctoral research into historical rhetorical pedagogy, this paper presents a conceptual framework for incorporating their rhetorical philosophy in contemporary university settings.
This paper proposes that the disconnect between historical rhetorical documents and today’s students can be effectively analyzed through Edward T. Hall’s theory of high- and low-context cultures. By applying this communications framework, a clear pedagogical problem is revealed. The high-context nature of medieval texts clashes directly with the low-context mindset of modern learners. To bridge this gap, this paper argues for a structured pedagogical approach grounded in the principles of Classical Reception Theory. This framework serves as a foundational component of my dissertation’s methodology, providing a theoretical lens through which to analyze the utility of historical rhetorical texts for contemporary instruction. The following sections will establish this theoretical foundation, analyze the communication gap in detail, and propose a specific two-pronged solution designed to transform historical documents from distant artifacts into dynamic tools for contemporary learning.
THE THEORETICAL FOUNDATION
To effectively outline a rhetorical pedagogy framework, this research employs an interdisciplinary synthesis. The method integrates Edward T. Hall’s foundational work on intercultural communication with the critical insights drawn from Classical Reception Theory. Hall introduced the concepts of high- and low-context cultures to provide a framework for understanding how societies communicate and interpret meaning[1]. His work originated from his experiences training U.S. diplomats at the Foreign Service Institute in the 1950s[2]. He observed that many communication breakdowns were not due to language barriers, but to unspoken cultural cues and assumptions. This led to his foundational book, The Silent Language[3], where he argued for the primacy of non-verbal, contextual communication. His later work, Beyond Culture[4], formally introduced the high- and low-context continuum.
In high-context cultures, a message is not found solely in the spoken or written word; a significant portion of its meaning is conveyed through implicit cues, nonverbal communication, and a vast body of shared knowledge and history[5]. Communication is nuanced, indirect, and layered, relying on a common history and shared social norms understood by all members of the group[6]. In a high-context negotiation, for example, a subtle change in posture or a moment of silence can be far more communicative than the verbal agreement itself. High-context societies tend to be collectivist, prioritizing group harmony and long-term relationships over individual achievement. A person from a high-context culture may find a blunt, overly detailed message from a low-context individual to be disrespectful or verbose, as if the speaker distrusts their shared understanding. [7]
In contrast, low-context cultures prioritize direct, explicit, and unambiguous communication. The meaning of a message is contained predominantly in the words themselves, leaving little room for ambiguity or interpretation[8]. Communication is seen as a tool for conveying information efficiently and transparently. In the case of low-context negotiation, every possible contingency must be explicitly spelled out to prevent misinterpretation. This style is particularly prevalent in diverse and mobile societies where a vast body of shared history and knowledge cannot be assumed among all individuals. Low-context cultures tend to be individualistic, placing a high value on personal achievement, logical reasoning, and explicit instructions[9]. For a person from a low-context culture, an indirect message from a high-context individual might appear vague, evasive, or even deceptive. They are conditioned to look for a clear, single meaning encoded directly in the text.
It is important to note that Hall’s theory has faced criticism, primarily for its potential to oversimplify complex cultural dynamics and for risking cultural stereotyping[10]. However, for a pedagogical framework, its value lies not in providing a rigid classification, but in offering a functionable heuristic[11]. It gives tangible vocabulary to discuss and analyze the unspoken assumptions and communication patterns that create distance between a text and its reader, making it an ideal diagnostic tool for a problem that is often felt but rarely articulated[12].
CLASSICAL RECEPTION THEORY
While Hall’s theory provides the conceptual lens for identifying the communication gap, Classical Reception Theory (CRT) offers the specific pedagogical methodology for bridging it. Developed by Martindale and Hardwick, following from the work of Hans-Georg Gadamer and the subsequent developments of Constance School of Reception Aesthetics (including Hans Robert Jauss and Wolfgang Iser), CRT marked a fundamental shift in literary and historical studies.[13] It moved classical scholarship away from a narrow focus on authorial intentionality or a simple historicist study of the past. Instead, it places a greater emphasis on the dynamic role of the reader.
CRT recognizes that a text’s meaning is not static but is created in the ongoing relationship between the text and its receivers. Jauss’s concept of the horizon of expectation is particularly relevant here. It suggests that a reader approaches a text with a pre-existing set of cultural, historical, and personal biases.[14] The challenge of a historical document is its ability to meet or defy this horizon. A medieval text written for a high-context audience, for example, will likely fall outside a modern student’s horizon of expectation, leading to a breakdown in meaning. By focusing on the reception of the text—the active interpretive process—CRT provides a framework for helping students understand not just what a document meant in its original context, but what it means to them now. This requires the student to acknowledge their own interpretive biases and actively work to expand their horizon to encompass the foreign context of the text, leading to a Gadamerian fusion of horizons.[15]
HALL AS A DIAGNOSTIC TOOL FOR CRT
Hall’s high- and low-context model provides the specific diagnostic tool for understanding the horizon of expectation that CRT addresses. Though this may not be a typical application of Hall’s approach to cultural communication, it proves effective in this specific context for addressing the cultural distance modern students may have with a text. Using it to diagnose this gap Hall’s framework can help an educator understand the interpretive difficulties that may be. This makes it easier to apply the principles of CRT to strategically expand the student’s interpretive horizon, moving them beyond their initial low-context biases toward a more nuanced, high-context understanding. This dual theoretical approach provides a comprehensive model for both identifying the problem and implementing a good course design with a better hope for student outcomes.
APPLYING HALL
An important question to ask – is it justifiable to state that a disconnect between medieval texts and the mindset of modern students can be explained from an intercultural communication point of view? The rhetorical texts of the Late Middle Ages can be justifiably described as examples of historical of high-context communication. Three, out of many examples can be selected – Hrabanus Maurus’s De institutione clericorum (c. 819), Hugh of St. Victor’s Didascalicon (c. 1120s), and John of Salisbury’s Metalogicon (c. 1159), which all exemplify this communication style. These have been chosen due to their wide spread synchronic proliferation and subsequent diachronic adaptation serving as good examples. Their reliance on shared religious, social, and academic knowledge meant that meaning was often implicit, subtle, and dependent on a specific, informed audience.
The foundational pillar of high-context communication in the Middle Ages in occidental Europe was the shared Christian and philosophical worldview. The Latin Church’s dominance in education created a unified cultural landscape where biblical stories, theological concepts, and moral allegories were universally understood by the educated class. Rhetorical texts and sermons, therefore, did not need to explicitly explain their allusions. For instance, Hrabanus Maurus, in his work on clerical training, could simply refer to an example from the lives of the Church Fathers, confident that his readers would grasp the full moral and historical weight of the allusion without a single explanatory note. The text assumes a thorough knowledge not only of the Bible and the lives of the saints but of its allegorical interpretation.
Beyond religion, medieval rhetoric was highly contextualized by its academic and literary traditions. These rhetorical treatises were not designed for a mass audience but for scholars and clergy who had undergone a rigorous education in the liberal arts[16]. John of Salisbury’s Metalogicon, for example, is a direct response to a specific intellectual debate of his time—the conflict between the verbal arts and the more practical sciences, often personified as the vetusversus the novus – ancient and new [17]. His intricate, multi-layered arguments are a product of a culture that valued implicit understanding over explicit instruction. A modern student would lack the necessary background knowledge to even recognize the existence of this debate, let alone understand the nuanced rhetorical moves John makes within the text.
One of the most significant obstacles to modern interpretation is the perceived irrelevance of the material. A contemporary student, may find chapters on topics like agriculture, or hunting, to be meaningless. This perspective, however, misses the high-context nature of these topics. In the medieval world view these subjects while literal, were also part of the wider lived experience of everyday live, particularly those of higher social status. Education was also served to teach moral virtues and societal roles. Hugh of St. Victor’s Didascalicon, for example, uses the physical act of building to explain the process of intellectual and spiritual growth [18]. The student who only sees the literal reference misses the entire point, a clear example of the communication gap at work.
THE LOW-CONTEXT MINDSET OF CONTEMPORARY STUDENTS
In an increasingly globalized and digital world, modern students are shaped by an environment that reinforces a low-context approach to communication. This is not a generational flaw, there is nothing inherently wrong with new ways of thinking. From a positive point of view it can be seen as a logical adaptation to the technological and educational systems in which they are immersed.[19] The digital landscape, dominated by text, image or short form video communication, is a primary driver of this low-context mindset. Platforms like instant messaging and social media require messages to be self-contained and easily understood without the benefit of nonverbal cues. A short, explicit tweet is valued for its clarity and shareability, while a long, nuanced message is often ignored. This, however, has drawbacks when extended into to students’ academic lives, where they are confronted by material that requires more nuance than their accustomed to a form of communication where meaning is not explicitly stated. The ephemeral nature of digital text stands in stark contrast to the permanence of a medieval manuscript, reinforcing a focus on immediate, explicit meaning.[20]
The shift from a classical to a pragmatic educational model has further cemented this low-context mindset. Up until early 20th century education, particularly at high school level, was highly geared toward the classics. Latin and Greek were core subjects in the curricula. Education beyond the early years was not universally accessible. With changing patterns in education in the mid-20th century, and with the rapid abandonment of Latin and Greek as core subjects, the educational models that were to dominate largely eschewed the classical experiences that were prominent in previous generations. Modern university curricula and assessments are now often designed around explicit instructions, rubrics, and quantifiable outcomes. A student’s success is typically measured by their ability to provide clear, direct answers and demonstrate explicit mastery of a subject. The economic world students will enter demand for immediate relevance is a direct consequence of their low-context conditioning. They are trained to seek information that is immediately applicable to a task or a personal goal—a skillset highly valued by employers. If a medieval text on rhetoric fails to meet this expectation, it is quickly dismissed as irrelevant, leading to a breakdown in communication and a lack of engagement.
A PEDAGOGICAL FRAMEWORK AND PROPOSED SOLUTIONS
The framework proposes a two-pronged pedagogical approach that moves students from a literal, low-context understanding of the sources to a more nuanced, high-context interpretation. The how involves a combination of explicit contextualization and scaffolded engagement with Classical Reception Theory.
Before a student engages with a historical text, instructors must act as a bridge, providing the necessary high-context knowledge in a familiar, low-context format. This prepares the student’s interpretive horizon to better receive the content. Providing resources that decode complex allusions can help get inside the world of the texts. This goes beyond a simple definition by providing cultural and historical context. For example, a useful tool are cultural glossaries. For example an entry for the liberal arts would not only define the term but would also explain its social significance in the medieval period and its specific components (the trivium and quadrivium), giving students the explicit knowledge that the original audience would have possessed implicitly.
Another method is through contextual lectures and visual aids, which offer brief lectures or videos that describe the author’s life, their education, and the socio-political environment in which the text was created. This could include visual aids such as maps of medieval trade routes, diagrams of the monastic educational structure, or images of the original manuscripts themselves. Obvious, yes, but such helps students understand the high-context world from which the text emerged and why a text was written in the way it was.
ACTIVE INTERPRETATION
Having a foundation the students move from passive receivers to active interpreters by making their own experience with the text a central part of the interpretive process. An initial low-context reading of the document is followed by a reception moment, in line with Isner’s concept of the implied reader[21], where students are prompted to reflect on their personal experience with the text. This is important as students’ own lived experiences create a new context for understanding the past.
The journey begins with an unguided initial reading of the historical text, followed by a reflective task such as a journal entry or a short essay. The goal is to capture the student’s immediate, unfiltered reaction to the text. This is where a student’s low-context mindset becomes the primary subject of study. The prompts would be designed to encourage this reflection: “What information is missing that you wish was there?” “What assumptions did the author make that you don’t share?” or “How does your personal background help or hinder your understanding of this world?” This stage forces students to consciously acknowledge their own interpretive biases, a critical first step in developing metacognitive awareness of their own communication style.
Following this initial reflection, the instructor provides the explicit contextual information prepared in the previous step. This is the moment where the historical horizon is intentionally introduced. Students are then asked to re-engage with the text, this time with a new, more informed perspective. This could involve a guided group discussion where they compare their initial low-context frustrations with their new, more nuanced understanding. Through this process, they begin to see how the historical and cultural context fills in the “gaps” they previously identified, transforming what seemed like an empty or irrelevant text into a rich and meaningful document.
The final stage culminates in an assignment that asks students to analyze how the text’s historical meaning and their own personal meaning can be reconciled, or as Gadamer would say fused. This goes beyond simply understanding the text’s historical context; it requires them to articulate its enduring relevance. This could take the form of a research paper, a final presentation, or a creative project where they argue for the text’s contemporary value. For example, a student might translate a rhetorical strategy from a medieval text into a modern political speech or a social media campaign, demonstrating their ability to navigate between the high-context world of the past and their low-context world of the present. This final stage proves that the student has moved beyond simply acquiring knowledge to actively creating meaning.
This approach provides a concrete methodology for instructors to cultivate the interpretive skills required to bridge the communication gap, aligning with Hall’s framework of context-aware communication. This method helps students become active participants in creating meaning from the past, enabling a deeper engagement with historical documents.[22]
FURTHER AVENUES OF EXPLORATION
While this study has sought to bring intercultural communication into my dissertation research, there are a number of weaknesses that should be highlighted. Firstly, Hall’s Low/High context typology was not specifically designed to be applied in the way I have done so. The complexity of a student’s entire cultural background must be taken into account. A student from a low cultural context may respond very well to a text that and instructor may claim is from a high cultural context, and vice versa. Also, within any given class group, there will be a variation in cultural experience, engagement and general understanding. Secondly, there is a considerable body of published work in the field of pedagogy and educational theory that has not been consulted. While this would be of benefit, the fact that this research is in rhetoric, and not education, needs to be kept to the forefront. As the research progresses, particularly when it comes to course design.
CONCLUSION
The effective teaching of pre-modern texts requires more than a simple reading and simple interpretation of historical facts. It demands an active bridging of culture, an interpretive act that is both intellectual and deeply personal. An intercultural perspective can lay an effective foundation to build an understanding of what is currently taking place in our classrooms. By applying Edward T. Hall’s theory, rhetorical educators are provided with a tool that can help understand the difficulties in using texts and practices. This approach not only helps students bridge the communication gap with medieval sources but also provides them with a practical tool to understand themselves as interpreters of culturally distant texts. This methodology, which forms the core of my dissertation’s theoretical framework, can be applied to other humanistic fields that deal with historical or culturally remote texts, enabling a deeper and more personal engagement with the past. The result is a more effective teaching model that equips students not only with a knowledge of history but also with the critical thinking skills necessary to navigate an increasingly complex, interconnected world. By using the high/low context model teachers can transform potentially irrelevant historical documents into dynamic learning tools that remain essential to a liberal arts education.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Hall, E. T. (1959). The Silent Language. Doubleday.
- _________(1976). Beyond Culture. Anchor Books.
- Harwick, L. (2003).Reception Studies. Oxford University Press.
- Iser, W. (1978). The act of reading: A theory of aesthetic response. Johns Hopkins University Press.
- Kerneza, M. (2024). Horizon of Expectation in Contemporary Literary Education. Futurity Research Publishing 3(2): 1-10.
- Malpas, J. (2025). Hans-Georg Gadamer. In E. N. Zalta & U. Nodelman (Eds.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2025 ed.). Stanford University.
- Martindale, C. (1993). Redeeming the Text: Latin Poetry and the Hermeneutics of Reception. Cambridge University Press.
- McSweeney, B. (2002). The Hall of Shame: An analysis of the critiques of Edward T. Hall. Organization Studies 23(1): 173-195. [Online]
- Phelan, O. M. (2016). New insights, old texts: Clerical formation and the Carolingian Renewal in Hrabanus Maurus. Traditio 71: 63–89. [Online]
- Rogers, E. M., & Steinfatt, T. M. (1999). Intercultural Communication. Waveland Press.
- Samovar, L. A., Porter, R. E., McDaniel, E. R., & Roy, C. S. (2017). Communication between cultures (9th ed.). Cengage Learning.
- Ting-Toomey, S., & Chung, L. C. (2012). Understanding intercultural communication (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press.
- Utter, C. F. (2025). The interpretive challenge of volatility: Textual stability in the age of generative AI and cloud infrastructure. Digital Humanities Quarterly 19(2): 1–15.
- Wogan-Browne, J. (2013). The rhetoric of community: Reading and social practice in the Middle Ages. University of Toronto Press.
Translations of Primary Sources
- Garry, D. D. (1955). The Metalogicon of John of Salisbury: A Twelfth-Century Defense of the Verbal and Logical Arts of the Trivium. University of California Press.
- Taylor, J. (1995). The Didascalicon of Hugh of St. Victor: A Medieval Guide to the Arts. Columbia University Press.
About the author:
Shane Crombie, D.Min, is an Associate Professor at LCC International University, Klaipėda, Lithuania, and is currently undertaking Ph.D studies in Rhetoric at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”
[1] Hall, 1976a. [2] Rogers & Steinfatt, 1999: 63. [3] Hall, 1959b. [4] Hall, 1976a. [5] Samovar et al., 2017: 256. [6] Ting-Toomey, & Chua, 1988: 22. [7] Rogers & Steinfatt, 1999: 79. [8] Samovar et al., 2017: 235. [9] Ting-Toomey, 1999: 25. [10] McSweeney, 2002: 71. [11] Samovar et al., 2017: 351. [12] Ting-Toomey, & Chua, 1988: 28. [13] Martindale, 1993Martindale was the first English-language classicist to publish on Classical Reception Theory (CRT). Hardwick was instrumental in its development, expanding its applications into a practical tool. While others were involved, these two scholars are often considered the forbearers of the field. See further Martindale, 1993 and Harwick, 2003. [14] Kerneza 2024: 3. [15] Malpas 2025: 32. [16] Phelan, 2007: 73. [17] This is from the English translation of the Metalogicon used for research. (Trans. D.McGarry). [18] This is from the English translation of the Didascalicon used for research. (Trans. J. Taylor). [19]Samovar et al., 2017: 335. [20] Cf Utter, C. F. (2025. [21] Isner, 1978. [22] Much of this is a synthesis of Martindale and Harwick’s approach, tailored to the specific needs of the research being currently undertaken.