Performing Citizenship in Plato's Laws

A study of the ethical underpinning of the rhetoric of citizenship in Plato's Laws and its implementation through ritualized forms of performance.

Lucia Prauscello (Author)

9781107421165, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 19 October 2017

282 pages
21.7 x 14 x 1.5 cm, 0.38 kg

In the Laws, Plato theorizes citizenship as simultaneously a political, ethical, and aesthetic practice. His reflection on citizenship finds its roots in a descriptive psychology of human experience, with sentience and, above all, volition seen as the primary targets of a lifelong training in the values of citizenship. In the city of Magnesia described in the Laws erôs for civic virtue is presented as a motivational resource not only within the reach of the 'ordinary' citizen, but also factored by default into its educational system. Supporting a vision of 'perfect citizenship' based on an internalized obedience to the laws, and persuading the entire polity to consent willingly to it, requires an ideology that must be rhetorically all-inclusive. In this city 'ordinary' citizenship itself will be troped as a performative action: Magnesia's choral performances become a fundamental channel for shaping, feeling and communicating a strong sense of civic identity and unity.

Introduction
Preliminaries
Part I. Performing Ordinary Virtue in Plato's Utopias: Citizenship, Desire and Intention: 1. Citizenship in Callipolis
2. Citizenship in Magnesia
Part II. Citizenship and Performance in the Laws: 3. Choral performances, persuasion and pleasure
4. Patterns of chorality in Magnesia
5. Comedy and comic discourse in Magnesia
6. Epilogue: on law, agency and motivation.

Subject Areas: Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500 [HPCA], Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB]