Volume 14, Issue 1
Julie D. Nelson
Public discourse surrounding recently recovered African American cemeteries in Tampa, FL is often inaccurate and misleading. Taking up Zion Cemetery as a case study, I identify three rhetorical tropes commonly employed in discourse about Zion and related Black cemeteries in Tampa—mystery, apathy, and absence. These tropes obscure Zion’s history: it was unjustly seized by the city of Tampa, headstones were removed, and the land was redeveloped for expanding white suburbs. Following analysis of news media reporting, a city press conference, and a state-wide report, I argue for a recontextualization of Zion as a memory place that commemorates Black history and agency.Keywords: African American History, Black Cemeteries, Justice, News Media, Public Memory
Thomas A. Salek
On July 28, 2022, comedian and activist Jon Stewart excoriated obstructionist Republican senators for blocking the passage of the PACT Act, legislation that would have provided healthcare and benefits to nearly 3.5 million veterans who were exposed to toxic substances during their time in the service. As a rhetorical leader, Stewart used his celebrity ethos to help generate publicity for the PACT Act and the partisan gamesmanship that stalled the legislation’s passage. To reach a nonpartisan audience, Stewart’s rhetoric shifted the exigency from the failure of the PACT Act’s passage to the broader threat of cruel partisan politicians who worked against the welfare of selfless veterans. By reframing the exigency, using profanity, and deploying the diatribe, Stewart’s speech blamed lawmakers for creating an obscene political scene that subjugated the interests of the country and welfare of veterans in favor of partisan extremism. I argue that Stewart’s rhetoric used a nonpartisan dissociation argument as a wedge for political transformation by encouraging Americans to abandon obscene and cruel partisan gamesmanship. To ameliorate this political environment, Stewart offered lawmakers and citizens a choice about the future: help vulnerable veterans and fulfill the country’s foundational principles or maintain cruel partisan gamesmanship that worked against members of the military and the will of the American people. Keywords: Diatribe, Dissociation, Mortification, Profanity, Rhetorical Leadership
Everything and Nothing: Myths of White Supremacy and “Irishness” in the Age of Trump
Benjamin P. Sweeney
Myths underpin all group identities. Understanding contemporary American socio-political upheaval requires examining how these myths inform ideology and identity, and how they work to orient communities towards political action. In recent years, white supremacy has formed (or re-formed) as one powerful rhetorical mythology. Examining this formation, I draw upon McGee’s and Charland’s essays regarding political mythmaking and constitutive rhetoric, Crockford’s work in alt-right populism and white supremacy, and Kaufmann’s research on white identity, nationalism, and voting behaviors. I then consider some of the ways Donald Trump’s recent speeches tap into and utilize this mythology. I also critically investigate the “Irish”/ “Celtic” versions of white supremacy and how the rhetoric of white supremacy appropriates popular myths, symbols, and memories of Irish America, at times doing so in service of Trump’s political agenda. Finally, I offer a contribution to the greater rhetorical and social discussion, arguing against merely attempting to counter “regressive” with “progressive” mythmaking, but also arguing for encouraging critical thought and for empathetic engagement with ideological others. Keywords: constitutive rhetoric; Donald Trump; myth; nationalism; white supremacy
Tracing Blue: A Burkean Cluster Analysis of Websites Selling the Thin Blue Line Flag
Bryan Lutz
Carson Babbit
The Thin Blue Line (TBL henceforth) is a phrase often invoked by law enforcement and their supporters. In 2014, the TBL became a contentious image when a college student embedded a blue line within a black and white American flag while, not coincidently, Black Lives Matter activists enacted anti-racist efforts across the United States. The controversy now involves legislature in Florida, which in 2023, legislated similar protections for the TBL flag that exist for the American flag, state flags, and POW/MIA flags. Policymakers uneasy about racial unrest need to hear evidenced arguments and take decisive action. Scholars can make such arguments because they have examined racist discourse and Whiteness using Burkean Methods. This study analyzes twenty-five websites selling the TBL flag and related merchandise. Over 1,000 images collocating with the TBL flag are cataloged, sorted for frequency, and compared to reference sources such as the US government’s catalog of police symbols and the Anti-Defamation League’s database of hate symbols. The analysis shows what meanings are being sold by TBL retailers compared to competing interpretations of the TBL as either a symbol of White Nationalism or a symbol honoring police. Keywords: Kenneth Burke, Cluster Analysis, The Thin Blue Line, White Nationalism, Racism
Volume 13, Issue 1
Rhetorical Strategies of 2024 Presidential Hopefuls
Jim A. Kuypers
Introduction to special issue.
William F Harlow
President Donald Trump has drawn significant Republican opposition to his 2024 election bid. Much of that opposition has come from former Trump administration officials who are practicing a form of strategic silence by saying they will continue similar policies while using a more restrained rhetorical style. One of those officials was former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. This essay examines the 2024 presidential campaign of Secretary Pompeo and uses it as the basis to make some informed predictions concerning the election next year. Keywords: 2024 Presidential campaign, Donald Trump, Mike Pompeo, rhetoric of silence, strategic noise, strategic silence.
Patrick G. Wheaton
In February 2023, Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina and former Trump ambassador to the United Nations, rescinded her vow not to challenge Trump for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination and announced her candidacy. She made the announcement from Charleston and then promptly held campaign events in New Hampshire and Iowa, the traditional first primary/caucus states. In her campaign rhetoric, Haley has, to date, sidestepped questions about Trump, declaring that she is running against Joe Biden. This essay examines Haley’s early primary campaign rhetoric as she constructs Biden and the liberal left as her, and our, enemy, and identifies the important issues in contemporary national politics. Haley has discussed her jobs and education record as South Carolina’s governor and focused internationally on immigration, China, Iran, and Russia, drawing upon her experience in the UN. Haley has declared it is time for a new (presumably younger) generation of leadership, while also articulating traditionally conservative policy positions. Keywords: Nikki Haley, presidential campaigns, political communication, political rhetoric.
Politics and the Future: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez As Rhetorical Educator
Carson S. Kay
The year prior to a presidential election is marked with public conjecture regarding which political figures will launch their presidential campaigns. This article focuses on one of those figures who has been the subject of periodic speculation: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Given the young representative’s vagueness regarding a presidential run and her emphatic conclusion that she will not run for Senate in 2024, Ocasio-Cortez’s future plans have yet to be defined. In this commentary piece, I argue that Ocasio-Cortez’s rhetorical choices suggest that she is not seeking the presidency in 2024. Rather, I believe that her communicative choices online and offline reflect that she is establishing herself in the House of Representatives as a communicative expert and educator. By revisiting memorable moments in Ocasio-Cortez’s public communication, I underscore why I conclude that she does not plan to run in the 2024 presidential race. Keywords: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, presidential candidates, presidential elections, political campaigns, political communication, rhetoric.
Ron DeSantis as Mainstream Radical
Jim A. Kuypers
Ron DeSantis had made national headlines well before being reelected governor of Florida by the largest margin seen in the past forty years, almost 20 full points, even as he had taken no national level interviews. A large part of his gain in national attention came through what I call a rhetorical strategy of “poking the bear,” with the bear in this case being the national media. By adopting the mainstream stance on a few key mainstream issues that the press, as a left leaning institution, would be certain to cover as controversial, even as radical, DeSantis was able to position himself as a viable contender for the Republican presidential nomination, even as he had not announced his candidacy. Keywords: news media, political campaigns, political communication, political reporting, political rhetoric, presidential primary, Republican, Ron DeSantis
Challenges for the Second-in-Command: Kamala Harris as a Presidential Candidate
Ann E. Burnette
Vice President Kamala Harris is an unlikely presidential candidate in 2024, but she could mount a second run for the presidency in a future election cycle. When Harris launched her presidential campaign in 2019, she brought her experience as an Attorney General and US Senator from California to the race. She also generated excitement as a female, African American and Asian American candidate who could speak to multiple constituencies. This essay examines three rhetorical challenges Harris could face during a future presidential campaign: the rhetorical framing of her experience as vice president, the rhetorical framing of her gender, and the rhetorical framing of her experience as a bi-racial African American and Asian American politician. The rhetorical choices she makes and the media coverage she receives will affect her political opportunities as well as the opportunities of those who follow her. Keywords: African American political candidates, Asian American political candidates, double bind, Kamala Harris, political communication, presidential campaigns, rhetoric, women political candidates.
Volume 12, Issue 3
John H. Saunders
In addition to previewing the articles published in this specific issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric, this article makes an argument over a convergence of audience and public memory text where the text becomes alive with a pulse. Keywords: Living, Public Memory, Pulse
“There Are Two Sides to Every Story”: Text and Con-Text at The Mob Museum
Brian L. Ott
Cari Whittenburg
The Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, better known as “The Mob Museum,” in Las Vegas, Nevada, affords a deeply conflicted rhetorical experience of text and context. On one hand, the Museum’s strict spatial structure, recurrent tropes of justice, and sensory-rich interactive exhibits promote a strongly pro-law enforcement message. On the other hand, the Museum’s con-texts, its externally contracted marketing efforts, independently designed gift shop, addition of a moonshine distillery and speakeasy called The Underground, and location in downtown Las Vegas, all work to transform organized crime into an object of spectacle, entertainment, and consumption. A closing section of the essay explores the implications of our analysis for understanding text-context relations. Keywords: Context, Museums, Public Memory, Text, The Mob Museum
Julia Medhurst
Asha S. Winfield
Tina M. Harris
The last few years have been marked with several media programs that travel back in time to color the past, give contrast to its picture, and widen the frame constraining the overexposed image of American life in the 1960s, particularly in the South for Black families. In 2021, ABC released the reboot of the 1980s television show The Wonder Years (2021) featuring the Williamses, a Black middle-class family living in Alabama during the late 1960s. The young boy protagonist, Dean Williams, uses living memory to insert, highlight, and center real moments in American history with Black voices and experiences. Using bell hooks’ oppositional gaze, Badia Ahad-Legardy’s Afro-nostalgia, and Critical Race Theory’s (CRT) counterstorytelling, we posit that living memory for Black audiences exists with and beyond the immovable, oft untouchable earthy materials of museums, historical markers, street signage, and popular speeches. Further, we argue that the remaking of Black American scenes in popular culture is an intentional recuperation of Black public memory, a necessary revival for the advancement of contemporary Black resistance. This retelling uses stories of color and in color to produce a living public memory that contests the incomplete, hegemonic narratives of past and present. Keywords: Afro-Nostalgia, Black Public Memory, Oppositional Gaze, Television, The Wonder Years (2021)
Memory and Martyrdom: The Transmogrification of Ashli Babbitt
Roseann M. Mandziuk
Martyrdom is a rhetorical creation rendered into public memory to uphold a specific world view or agenda. During the U.S. Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021, Ashli Babbitt, a previously unremarkable and unknown 35-year-old white woman, was killed by a Capitol officer. This essay explores the rhetorical process of transmogrification that was enacted to anoint Babbitt as a radical right martyr. Her martyrdom developed over three acts, first through its articulation by extremist communities, next followed by the wider merchandization and promotion of her martyrdom via public memorializations, conservative media, and Republican members of Congress, and culminated in her appropriation in service of the right’s “New Lost Cause” particularly in the rhetoric of Donald Trump. Babbitt’s martyrdom was evoked as a powerful symbol promulgated by the right as it sought to transform the public memory of January 6th into a narrative of good patriotic Americans under siege. Keywords: Ashli Babbitt, Kenneth Burke, martyr, public memory, radical right, rhetorical transmogrification, white supremacy
John H. Saunders
Collecting relics from notable public events has long been practiced. We name numerous public museums and private collections that store, curate, and engage these relics. This article provides a theory for how mundane items are imbued with public memory, and how to understand that value once imbued. Keywords: Artifacts, Public Memory, Relics, Rhetoric
Moonshine Stories: Shaping Appalachian Public Memory
Wendy Atkins-Sayre
Ashli Quesinberry Stokes
This essay adds nuance to our understanding of the meaning of moonshine and whiskey public memories in the Blue Ridge Mountains, accounting for the history, the role in producing messages of resilience in the region, and the problems and possibilities that the contemporary moonshine/whiskey narrative brings to the region. We argue that contemporary rhetorical work surrounding distilling creates and reinforces public memory surrounding Southern Appalachia and that those public memories serve multiple purposes. Many of the contemporary narratives that emerge from the Southern Appalachian moonshine and tourism industry more broadly present a conflicting version of the region. Specifically, mainstream moonshine memories feed into the stories of resiliency in the region, but come at the expense of glamorizing a white, masculine, impoverished, law-breaking culture, eliminating and silencing other characters who play a part in this history and creating limited and unproductive roles for Appalachians. Alternative narratives provide a compelling story of resilience of tradition, regions, and people that create a more productive role for Appalachians. Ultimately, we argue that accounting for everyday rhetorical reflections of public memory is vital because of the significant role of public memory in shaping regions and identities. The case study examined here provides an example of public memory interventions and the potential for creating more nuanced images of cultural traditions. Keywords: Appalachia, foodways, moonshine, public memory, Southern culture
Sandra L. French
Lisa Baker Webster
The digital age provides fertile ground for arguments that use analogies of Hitler, Nazis, and fascism. In this article we examine two specific types of Hitler analogies – arguments that ridicule and arguments that denigrate. We argue that both types of Hitler analogies malign the realities of World War II and the Holocaust, reducing Hitler and his atrocities to little more than a comedic punchline or political propaganda in contemporary public memory. Keywords: Denigration, Hitler, Holocaust, Nazi, Public Memory, Ridicule
Volume 12, Issue 2
Creating Purpose, Power, and Passion: Sister Souljah and the Rhetoric of Hip Hop
Andre E. Johnson
Damariyé L. Smith
This article introduces a special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric addressing the rhetoric of Hip Hop. The essays that follow address a wide range of salient issues, showcasing both how scholars of rhetoric contribute to a richer understanding of Hip Hop and rhetoric and how Hip Hop helps to shape our understanding of rhetoric. Keywords: Rhetoric of Hip Hop
The Hip-Hop Sublime: On the Phenomenology of Hip-Hop’s Sound
Hip-Hop’s aesthetics have traditionally been associated with literacy in hip-hop scholarship, focusing on how sampling and written lyrical content mirror the production of literary poetry. However, this type of association with literacy relies on an ideology of literacy that places literacy at the top of an aesthetic hierarchy. This hierarchy is particularly problematic given the racialized stakes of literacy in the United States. In practice, however, Hip-Hop resists this association with literacy, particularly in the realm of the sonic. Hip-Hop’s sound functions phenomenologically—evading the capture of the sign—in a formation that this paper refers to as the Hip-Hop sublime. Building on a tradition of signifying beyond words in the Black expressive tradition, the Hip-Hop sublime refers to the affective communal registers of sound that are only available in relationship with the musical culture itself. Attention to the Hip-Hop sublime not only impacts theorizations of Hip-Hop’s sound, but it also proposes a disposition of listening that insists on a communally interpretative relationship between listener, artist, and community. Keywords: Hip-Hop, Hip-Hop sublime, Black music, literacy, phenomenology
The Political Efficacy of Kendrick Lamar’s Performance Rhetoric
In contrast to those who view political efficacy as only affecting public policy, this article argues that self-narration involving a critique of the state like those issued from Kendrick Lamar’s televised award show performances in 2015, 2016, and 2018 are political gestures that broaden the national conversation on racially-motivated police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement. The four performances discussed here provide a clear view of how hip hop rhetoric engages with and disputes common sense discourse rooted in white supremacist logics, particularly regarding the infallibility of police and the criminality of Black bodies. The sum of Lamar’s discourses and his political critiques characterizes a rhetorical device I call a poetics of inversion, a varied, multivalent, and politically efficacious rhetorical strategy involving self-narration, political gestures, and reformulation of hegemonic American mythologies. Examining Lamar’s performances brings into focus the political efficacy of his lyrical rhetoric and his visual, auditory, and performative rhetorical gestures. Keywords: hip hop rhetoric, Black Lives Matter, political efficacy, poetics of inversion, Kendrick Lamar
Capitalistic Recuperation: The Spectacle of Performative Progressivism in Hip Hop
This article explores the state of mainstream Hip Hop and the rhetoric of consumption that is so persuasive today. We begin with a discussion of the educational system and how it functions as an ideological state apparatus to propagate capitalism as a benevolent ideological foundation. This propagation is a form of control that helps maintain the status quo. We describe the dehumanization and alienation within the educational system using a Freirean perspective. The article ends with a critical analysis of the process of capitalistic recuperation in Hip Hop and how this operates within the spectacle as described by Guy Debord. Keywords: Hip Hop, consumption, Paulo Freire, spectacle
Black Joy in the Hour of Chaos: ‘911 is a Joke’ and Its Multiple Messages of Resistance
The video “911 is a Joke” offers more than just a critique of America’s healthcare system disparities. The rapper Flavor Flav shows a gleefully absurdist call to action for oppressed peoples and their allies. In this essay, I examine the video of “911 is a Joke” to argue that the music samples and Flavor Flav’s visual performances urge us to find the joy in rejecting subordination to White Supremacy. Keywords: Public Enemy, Flavor Flav, Black Lives Matter, Healthcare, COVID-19
Last Night a DJ Saved My Life: The Theorhetorical Significance of Club Quarantine
The search for the sacred is often intensified during times of crisis. There have been varied rhetorical responses during the COVID-19 crisis in the Black community, with much of them initiating from within the church. The sacred/secular dichotomy has created difficultly for some churches to adapt virtually. Despite this tension, fresh theorhetorical moments are emerging that are not necessarily occurring within the church. Compelling events on social media have created community and healing, warranting a scholarly examination from a theorhetorical perspective.
In this essay, we attempt to do this by offering an examination of DJ D-Nice’s Club Quarantine on Instagram. Drawing upon sources from rhetorical theology and theomusicology, we argue that Club Quarantine creates a virtual space that reframes both sacred and secular. Moreover, by understanding the rhetorical dynamics of DJ Nice’s performance, we also maintain that Club Quarantine blurs that sacred/secular divide by providing its own unique brand of holiness that spoke to many while dealing with quarantine and stay at home orders. Keywords: Rhetorical theology, sacred, secular, hip hop, homiletics
A Call (and Response) To Battle Rap
DiArron M.
Dianna Watkins Dickerson
Although battle rap is not a new cultural phenomenon on the hip hop scene, its value as a text is not widely listed in academic circles. Therefore, we contend battle rap culture is a prime space to analyze the influence and inherent understanding of hip hop. This art form’s struggle, strain, conquest, and challenge ebbs and flows like an athletic competition infusing a culturally distinct experience of Black ontology. With this in mind, we argue battle rap creates a competitive podium where we can examine communication, culture and critically assess identification within specific groups. Keywords: Battle Rap, Black Identity, Rhetoric, Hip Hop
Volume 12, Issue 1
“You Can’t Be What You Can’t See”: Analyzing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Environmental Rhetoric
Corynn Oceana Miller
Emma Frances Bloomfield
Contemporary environmental messages pose new relationships between humans, the environment, and the economy that warrant analysis in our climate crises. We analyze the ideological messaging in the Green New Deal and “A Message from the Future With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez” to argue that their environmental rhetorics perform climate casuistry. We define climate casuistry as an environmental version of casuistic stretching that modifies anthropocentric ideologies to create strategic opportunities for the promotion of environmental justice. By working within the hegemonies of our current political system, the GND and Message provide a template for reshaping traditional relationships and imagining more just and sustainable futures. Keywords: environmental rhetoric, climate casuistry, casuistic stretching, Green New Deal, environmental justice
Gabrielle L. Orbe
Our analysis of “The Squad’s” 2021 Twittersphere demonstrates how, individually and collectively, the six BIPOC congressional members embrace the values of invitational rhetoric. An invitational rhetorical orientation is apparent in the ways in which their verified Twitter accounts invite others in their worlds, demonstrate relational-communal support, and extend a sense of solidarity to others, as a means to cultivate the same for others. Further, our paper highlights the various ways in which “The Squad” utilized this social media platform to negotiate interactions-both in-person and virtually-with others who aggressively attacked their personal, cultural, and political identities: (1) Taking the high road, (2) speaking truth to power, and (3) defending themselves and their right to safety. In doing so, we provide significant insight in how invitational rhetoric theory and practice functions as a foundation to enact social change within a divisively partisan political world. Keywords: Invitational rhetoric, BIPOC politicians, The Squad, U.S. politics, Twitter, Social media
Masculinity and PTSD: Violence among Veterans in the BBC Series Peaky Blinders
This essay reflects on cinematic history and the recurrent portrayals of Post-Traumatic Stress Survivors depicted as violent criminals, most recently in the popular British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) television series Peaky Blin-ders (2013-2022). Suffering the effects of World War 1, a group of veterans build a criminal empire throughout the industrial complex of Birmingham. Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy) and Arthur Shelby (Paul Anderson) mitigate the effects of “shell shock” through their own ascendant behavior. Tommy is inward dwelling and stoic, while Arthur outward facing and violent. What in a contemporary sense is toxic, becomes validated in times of impending war. Tommy acts under the authority of Prime Minister Winston Churchill in an assassination attempt on British Fascist Oswald Mosley. In season 6 the Shelby’s prepare to battle Adolf Hitler at the advent of World War 2. Character profiles in the series support hegemonic masculinity theory, where men practice domination over other disenfranchised men and hold hierarchy over women. Peaky Blinders provides a unique insight into the cinematic trope of PTSD survivors as capable, violent gangsters. War wasn’t the choice or intention, but continued violence becomes the cure for those coping with the ravages of military conflict. Keywords: Hegemonic masculinity, BBC, Peaky Blinders, World War 1, Post-Traumatic Stress
Volume 11, Issue 1/2
Ryan Corso-Gonzales
In October of 2019, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg streamed a speech from Georgetown University defending the company’s practice of not regulating or rejecting blatantly false political advertisements placed on their site. The speech, part of his “transparency tour” to allay concerns about the growing social power and stunning irresponsibility of Facebook, presents a troubling articulation of “voice” along neoliberal lines that atomizes the individual, separates activism from communities, and conflates activity on Facebook with free expression. In this essay, we use rhetorical scholarship on voice to illuminate how Zuckerberg’s speech both relies on and retrenches neoliberal rationality to flatten difference and resistance in the public sphere. Following that analysis, we highlight the broader implications for Zuckerberg’s redefinition of voice for the study of rhetoric and democracy. Keywords: Neoliberalism, Political Rhetoric, Facebook, Democracy, Public Sphere
In 2010, the Texas State School Board revised the Texas Essential Knowledge Standards (TEKS) that determine text-book content for Texas’s public schools for the next ten years, and immediately drew criticism for their deliberate attempt to inject a “Christian” ideology into the TEKS. At the time, this effort drew nationwide attention because the textbooks that Texas schools decide to use also determines the textbook choices for 48 other states. Most of the criticism leveled against the Board focused on problems associated with privileging Christianity in the classroom. However, through a more in-depth rhetorical analysis of the changes made to the TEKS, we argue that the dominant ideology being forwarded is instead “American Exceptionalism.” The TEKS adopted in 2010 are in the process of being revised, and at this 10-year mark, we have a chance to reflect on the relationship between the values taught in the classrooms and the manifestations of those values in society. We argue that this is crucial research, because if Cynthia Dunbar, former Texas SBOE member, and author of One Nation, Under God is right in supporting the claim that the philosophy of the classroom in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next, we should be concerned about what happens in those classrooms. Keywords: Textual Analysis, Terministic Screens, American Exceptionalism, Texas Educational Knowledge Standards
Modern Masculinities: Resistance to Hegemonic Masculinity in Modern Family
Cory Geraths
Since its debut in 2009, the ABC television show Modern Family has captivated audiences and academics alike. The show professes a modern perspective on families, but many scholars have concluded that its male characters uphold problematic, normative expressions of gender. In contrast, we use the concept of hegemonic masculinity to argue that Modern Family resists normative expressions of masculinity by attuning viewers to the socially constructed nature of hegemonic masculinity and by authorizing feminine and flamboyant behaviors as appropriately manly. These counterhegemonic strategies work in tandem to scrutinize confining expectations for men and to offer viable alternatives. Taken together, their coexistence mitigates against an oppressive hybrid version of hegemonic masculinity. Consequently, our analysis introduces readers to the rhetorical power of hegemonic masculinity and strategies to resist it; considers the efficacy of these strategies while drawing a wide audience; and stresses the importance of diverse gender representation in popular media. Keywords: Modern Family, Hegemonic Masculinity, Resistance, Comedy, Television, Sitcom
Rhetorical Witnessing and Unconcluded War: For Becoming-in-Loss
Profound social tensions and structuralized racial violence in the U.S. can be understood in terms of unconcluded war. This is not unique. Especially following civil wars that threaten the integrity of nation-states and that remain in important senses unconcluded, bearing witness offers possibilities for becoming-together in loss. This article examines a testimonial response to the Lebanese civil war’s ongoing shaping of society as instructive for the U.S. context, which is also shaped by unconcluded war. Reading U.S. and Lebanese contexts together through the lens of rhetorical witnessing, I discover historical hope in an apparent testimonial failure. A Lebanese testimonial assemblage—graffiti by artist Jad El-Khoury on the war-wounded Beirut Holiday Inn, cross-sectarian public outrage at the graffiti, and subsequent effacing of it by the Lebanese military—serves as an instance where rhetorical witnessing creates social space for becoming-together-in-loss. Such becoming offers possibilities for symbolic unification in contexts of unconcluded war. its Keywords: rhetorical witnessing; trauma; United States; Lebanon; civil war; race; sectarianism
Volume 10, Issue 1/2
Loaded Words: NRATV and the Making of Liberal America as a Public Enemy
This research examines the recently suspended online channel of the National Rifle Association, NRATV, through the frame and rhetorical analysis of 220 videos shared on its Twitter channel. The study provides systematic evidence to articulate how the NRA used the mantle of an online network devoted to guns to espouse hostile political discourses about liberal America. The study reveals a broadcast acutely dedicated to the discussion of perceived “enemies”—media outlets, Democrats, and social movements like the Women’s March—rather than subjects of gun rights or gun ownership. The findings established a rhetorical pattern by which these subjects were discussed, not as political opposition, but as domestic threats and public enemies. The research then explored the communication strategy of frame bridging, which NRATV hosts used often to align the so-called “violent left” with global threats, and to present liberal America as dangerous and anti-American. By explicitly linking the NRA platform to this series of anti-liberal themes, NRATV hosts were no longer advancing the organization’s core message of personal self-defense, but rather an ideological case for imminent national defense against the American left. Keywords: National Rifle Association (NRA), gun rights discourse, frame bridging, far-right politics, inciting hostility.
Multiplicity, Language & Survival: Rhetorical Movement in Trauma Survivor Narratives
This article leverages interview excerpts from human trafficking survivors to demonstrate that the stories told by survivors of trauma exhibit movement across and between rhetorical domains that purposefully operates to assert control over stories based on personal knowledge and language capacity, as well as to present stories to external audiences in an effort to leverage language to claim credibility. In so doing, the author shows how trauma-related storytelling practices operate as expressions of rhetorical ambiguity and multiplicity. This rhetorical multi-languagedness in trauma survivor storytelling reveals a discursive in-betweeness, or liminality, that survivors tactically navigate when telling stories about their experiences. By exploring the tension that exists within the language survivors use to tell their stories, the author demonstrates how they engage in a deft navigation of the politics of legitimation to travel between different discursive spaces and use language to adeptly engage in tactical refigurings of experience. Keywords: human trafficking, survivor storytelling, trauma narratives, rhetorical ambiguity
#ActsOfCivility: Implicit Arguments for the Role of Civility and the Paradox of Confrontation
In the literature, there are currently twin points of consensus about civility’s role in national political discourse. Civility is regarded as a necessary prerequisite for liberal democracies to function, yet also it is also rightfully seen as a constraining force which silences marginalized voices fighting for justice. In the following essay, I offer some common ground between these positions by suggesting a number of standards that determine when calls for civility are appropriate. Absent these standards in the public square, other strategies, such as confrontative rhetoric, are necessary to ensure equity and fairness. Consequently, calls for civility can further marginalize already precarious bodies. To make this case, I critically analyze the call for #ActsOfCivility to memorialize the late Senator John McCain on the first anniversary of his death. Implicit within this call are three standards that determine when civility is an appropriate commitment to make. I then show that, coincidentally, these standards offer a compelling reason why their call failed to resonate among American audiences. Keywords: civility, confrontation, implicit standards, political protest, whiteness, wealth & class, John McCain
Volume 9, Issue 3/4
Campus Activism in the Digital Age: An Ecological Chronology of #Concernedstudent1950
This essay builds an ecological chronology of student-led activism at the University of Missouri (in autumn, 2015), illustrating how advocates make sense of and advance the rhetorical action of which they are a part via social media. Through a critical-qualitative immersion in the social media network of various participants, we follow three phases of advocacy: publicizing personal experiences of racism; expanding political consciousness through #ConcernedStudent1950; and the ecology’s growth into a national antagonism pitting “free speech” against anti-racist activism. We conclude that by encouraging the campus community to hold MU administrators accountable, student activists achieved tangible outcomes, with potentialities for MU and other communities. Keywords: Media ecology, student protest, social media, social movements, digital activism
“Redemption Follows Allocution”: Dan Harmon and the #MeToo Apology
This article analyzes comedian and TV writer Dan Harmon’s famously well-received #MeToo-era apology for sexual misconduct on the set of his sitcom Community, noting how Harmon revises the traditionally individualistic genre of the apology into a statement of advocacy for the collective moral imperative of the #MeToo movement. After discussing #MeToo as a rhetorical situation that justifiably trivializes pleas for individual forgiveness, the article analyzes Harmon’s monologue in relation to scholarship on genre of apologia, contrasting Harmon’s with the comparatively individualistic and unsuccessful apology of Louis C.K and arguing that traditional apologies prove ill-suited to the #MeToo era. I contend, finally, that male speakers seeking redemption for sexual misconduct should heed Harmon’s example of sustained critical self-reflection, pronounced advocacy for victims, and sustained cultivation of an ethos that merits redemption. Keywords: #MeToo, apology, apologia, allocution, Dan Harmon, rhetorical situation, differentiation, transcendence, characterological coherence
On August 31, 2018, the life and legacy of Aretha Franklin was celebrated at a memorial service in a Detroit church. Over eight hours, political dignitaries, civil rights leaders, entertainers, friends, and family members paid a fitting tribute to a woman regarded as the Queen of Soul. The widely televised event took an unexpected political turn when Rev. Jasper Williams Jr., senior pastor emeritus of Salem Baptist Church in Atlanta, delivered Franklin’s eulogy and offered, in part, his critique of the Black Lives Matter movement. In short, Williams asserted that “black lives will not matter…until black people start respecting black lives and stop killing ourselves.” His rhetoric triggered a barrage of responses from others who argued about the intent, appropriateness, and effect of this political discourse. This
paper utilizes Kenneth Burke’s theory of dramatism to present a cultural-critical analysis of Williams’ rhetoric. In doing so, we intend to contribute to the growing body of scholarly literature regarding #BlackLivesMatter as a rhetorical movement. Keywords: #BlackLivesMatter, Aretha Franklin, Kenneth Burke, pentad, African American preaching
Thanks to Donald Trump, fake news has become a buzzword that allows for the dismissal of facts which are inconvenient to a person’s worldview. When used to characterize media sources, this rhetorical maneuver becomes an essentially irrefutable argumentative technique – a “trump” card that ends a discussion because the opposition’s premise is depicted as false. Since deploying the concept of fake news reinforces ideology and systems of power, this paper explores the phenomenon from the perspective of Gramscian hegemony. More specifically, Gramsci’s notion of common sense helps us understand the fallacious appeal of fake news. As a result, the paper discusses the implications of fake news in the context of hegemony and provides suggestions for potential ways to articulate good sense as a means to challenge the common sense of fake news. Keywords: Trump, political communication, argumentation, post-truth
Volume 9, Issue 1/2
Class Structure and the Movement of Capital: The Rhetoric of Supply Side Economics
On December 2, 2017, President Donald Trump signed into law the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which delivered $1.5 trillion in tax breaks to individuals and companies. While the law was noteworthy for the scale of its payouts to the wealthiest Americans and business interests, the rhetoric surrounding the bill was consistent with a durable discourse typically known as supply-side or “trickle down” economics. I argue that, despite their frequent failure in the real world, policy solutions based on the discourse of supply-side economics consistently earn public approval because they appeal to a complex of hegemonic ideological metaphors, which converge to help make a self-defeating choice seem the right one. Keywords: rhetoric of economics, metaphor, ideology, tropes, hegemony
Collaborative Leadership in Senate Democrats’ Opposition to Affordable Care Act Repeal Efforts
After the 2016 election, a narrative circulated suggesting that Democrats lacked leadership. In contrast to this narrative, I argue that Democrats used a collaborative form of leadership that enabled them to respond to the many challenges of their circumstance. Using the case of the 2017 Senate Democrats’ floor protest of efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, this essay develops a theory of collaborative rhetorical leadership. The essay demonstrates how Senate Democrats’ efforts, as an example of minority party rhetoric, flagged the deliberative process as inappropriate and hasty, challenged legislative mandates based on election results, and modeled collaborative argumentation. In doing so, I contend that minority parties, more broadly, can safeguard the deliberative process necessary for a thriving democracy by highlighting lack of debate, empowering constitute participation in the legislative process, and showcasing evidence-based public policy analysis as a critical cornerstone of governance. The analysis offers important lessons concerning minority party rhetoric and rhetorical leadership involving collaboration. Keywords: Congressional Rhetoric, Minority Party Rhetoric, Accumulation, Profusion, Senate
I examine political incivility in presidential discourse by comparting the themes emanating from the tweets of both Clinton and Trump during and after the 2016 election. The present study reveals that Clinton’s tweets focus on the central theme of attacking Trump, specifically as a liar, racist, sexist, foreign policy disaster, bully, and a danger to working class people. In Trump’s tweets, he also engages in attack themes against the mainstream media, specific Republicans, rival nations (such as Iran and North Korea), Hillary Clinton, and the character of Democrats. Trump’s tweets also utilize thematic appeals, such as appeals to “Make America Great Again,” and fear appeals against Mexicans, Muslims and other groups. Since Twitter use has increased in political communication, understanding its role in political rhetoric is crucial. Additionally, since many believe the 2016 election was one of the most divisive in recent history, an examination into related tweets provides insight into how incivility occurred. Ultimately, I argue that the use of Twitter encourages and emphasizes uncivil rhetoric in presidential politics. Keywords: rhetorical incivility, Trump, Clinton, Twitter, 2016 election
Robert J. Razzante
Katrina N. Hanna
Movement intellectuals in popular music are musical artists who educate an audience by sharing counter-narratives that reflect the concerns of a large mass of people. Since Dr. King’s assassination, Black musical artists have taken up his critical-structural paradigmatic worldview through the vernacular of their music. As such, Dr. King and his legacy live on through the messages and actions of artists. In adopting critical race theory and rhetoric, we hope to shed light on how it is Black artists educate a larger audience on the concerns raised by Black Americans over the last 50 years. That is, we examine the lyrical content and career pursuits of Black artists that raise an awareness of systemic oppression and ultimately move toward action. We first draw our attention to artists at the time of Dr. King’s rise and fall (Sam Cooke, the Staple Singers, and Curtis Mayfield). We then turn our attention to contemporary artists’ pursuit of social and economic justice (Common, Lupe Fiasco, and Chance the Rapper). Throughout our analysis, we tie artists’ lyrics and career moves back to Dr. King’s final “I Have Been to the Mountaintop” speech. Keywords: critical race theory, music, counter-narratives, vernacular, social movement.
Jihad, Social Media, and Popular Culture
This essay suggests that contemporary interpretations of jihad as violence or “fighting” be considered in the context of modern cultural formations central to the formation of modern subjects. Following on the thought of Marshall McLuhan, we observe a connection between the media and the message “because it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action.” By this, we can observe the ways in which media shapes jihad (and jihadists) in new ways and is in turn used to advance the cause of jihad–how does it structure the discourse of jihad and shape the jihadi imagination? What kinds of content does it insist upon? What kind of audience does it evoke? We find that ISIS propaganda on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube draws on popular culture to, in turn, become popular. Attending to the forces shaping discourses of jihad (and jihadist themselves) is vital if we are to understand not only why jihadism has become popular but also how what is popular has become part of jihad. Keywords: ISIS, jihad, popular culture, social media.
Volume 8, Issue 3
Dislocations and Shutdowns: MLK, BLM and the Rhetoric of Confrontation
Andre E. Johnson
This article introduces and frames a special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric entitled “From the Mountain Top and Beyond: Contemporary Meanings and Understandings of the Rhetoric of Martin Luther King Jr., 50 Years Later. During the last year of King’s life, his ability to persuade and to gain a national consensus around issues of war, poverty, economic injustice, and the inequality suffered by blacks and all people of color had waned. Faced with increasing hostility to him and the movement along with the rising white backlash, King knew that moral suasion would not give him the results that he had hoped. This lead King, to launch the Poor People’s Campaign as a movement of massive civil disobedience that would lead to economic boycotts and the shutdown entire cities. By doing this, King hoped that the government, sensitive to the dislocation and shutdowns would eventually do the “right thing.” I conclude by arguing that BLM whether knowingly or not, have adopted many of the ideas that King argued during the last year of his life becoming the natural extension of King’s vision in the last year of his life. Keywords: Martin Luther King Jr., Social Movements, Black Lives Matter, Protest Rhetoric, African American Public Address
Martin Luther King Jr., W.E.B. Du Bois, and Attitudes Toward Change
Jonathan M. Smith
Antonio de Velasco
There is a less recognized Martin Luther King Jr. who has received limited attention in history books. As King approached the final year of his life, his speeches appeared to evolve in their treatment of progress. One such speech is “Honoring Dr. Du Bois.” In this essay, we suggest that “Honoring Dr. Du Bois” provides a platform to partially understand the nature of King’s activism during his final year. We argue that the speech characterizes a perspective toward revolutionary change that differs significantly from the King of past years. In King’s earlier and most iconic speeches, he often treats change as tangible and achievable; however, in “Honoring Dr. Du Bois,” King regards social justice as an ongoing, indefinite journey. Therefore, we argue that rather than characterizing his activism as moving toward a “promised land” as he did in the “I Have a Dream” speech, “Honoring Dr. Du Bois” suggests that King now views progress as perpetual action with no clear-cut destination. Additionally, we argue that “Honoring Dr. Du Bois” provides a lens to examine the types of rhetorical moves King used to establish this evolved perspective. We contend that King employs synecdoche to establish and clarify his attitude. King eulogizes Du Bois while simultaneously adopting Du Bois’ activist philosophy and the trajectory of his life. Ultimately, King uses the speech as a rhetorical vehicle to express his current vision of change and progress in 1968. In our conclusion, we explore the presence of King’s sustaining influence in the contemporary US. Keywords: W.E.B Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr., Synecdoche, Substance, Change.
Children in the Dream: Barack Obama and the Struggle over Martin Luther King’s Legacy
David Deifell
The rhetoricity in the relationship between Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech and the election of Obama reveals hopes and anxieties about contemporary race relations. Examining the connection between an old rhetoric and its new realities, this study elaborates on the implications of popular articulations of Obama’s initial election to King’s Dream. Drawing on theories of constitutive rhetoric and interpellation, the essay frames King’s speech as a constitutive narrative with which we imagine race in America. Beyond its rhetorical situation, the speech continues shaping us as its political subjects, children of the Dream. An analysis of competing characterizations of Obama regarding that subject positioning elaborates on the rhetorical tension that developed into the debate about whether society has become post-racial or not. Perhaps innocent exuberance at first, the King-Obama link lays bare the consequences of positions Americans take in relation to increasingly divergent ideologies about race in America. Keywords: constitutive rhetoric, post-race, King, Obama, interpellation, narrative, subject position.
“My Living Shall Not Be in Vain”: The Rhetorical Power of Eulogies in the Face of Civil Unrest
Melissa Renee Harris
Ashley R. Hall
Rhetoric of eulogies traditionally follow an identifiable epideictic or deliberative form. However, the funeral orator may blend both forms as a hybrid rhetoric based on the life, death, and social conditions at the time of the eulogy. This essay provides a rhetorical analysis of the eulogy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for the young victims of the Sixteenth Street Church Bombing and the eulogy of Barack Obama for Rev. Clementa Pinckney after the massacre at Emanuel AME Church. The authors argue that historically the eulogies for murdered Blacks are socially significant as the rhetor uses purification, association, and unification as rhetorical tools to martyr the decedents and unite the audience in social corrective action. Further, the rhetorical situation is impacted by the need for justification of prematurely and unjustly lost life. There is currently an alarming trend of Blacks being murdered by police and racially charged incidents, often resulting in social upheaval within communities across the country. This analysis provides insight into the resulting eulogies of unjustified Black death and the rhetorical power of the eulogist when addressing communities on the verge of civil unrest. Keywords: Eulogies, African American rhetoric, Black, hybrid, martyr, justice.
WWMLKD?: Coopting the Rhetorical Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement
Michelle Kelsey Kearl
Created Equal, an anti-abortion organization based in Ohio, argues it is fulfilling the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement (CRM) by fighting widespread and systemic age discrimination. Putting to work the images, tactics, and rhetorics of the Civil Rights Movement and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK), Created Equal argues abortion enacts ageism and is worthy of formal civil rights protection. I argue that Created Equal leverages the ideographic ethos and pathos of the CRM and MLK to tap into American public memory of the man and the movement, then use them as ciphers in which they invest their own connotative meaning. This appropriation or coopting of the rhetorical legacy of MLK and CRM allows Created Equal to repurpose the past towards contemporary political ends incongruous with King and the movement. I draw implications to broader neoliberal rhetorical practices that appropriate progressive narratives, in both form and content, towards traditionally conservative aims. Keywords: Martin Luther King, Jr., Civil Rights Movements, abortion, ideograph, cipher.
Volume 8, Issue 1/2
White Supremacy in the Age of Trump: An Introduction to a Special Issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric
George F. McHendry, Jr.
This essay introduces a special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric on White Supremacy in the age of Trump. This essay recounts an abbreviated history of racism in the United States of America and myriad instances where white supremacy was a vibrant part of Donald J. Trump’s rise to political power. These events demonstrate that racial animus is both a cornerstone of American history and contemporary politics. Keywords: Donald Trump, White Supremacy, Alt-Right
Alt-White: Conceptualizing the “Alt-Right” as a Rhetorical Bridge between White Nationalism and Mainstream Public Discourse
Stephanie L. Hartzell
Contemporary scholarship on race from critical rhetorical perspectives has revealed the dominance of a color-blind racial ideology and its accompanying norms of race-evasive discourse in the post-1960’s United States. In the “Age of Trumpism,” however, there has been a marked resurgence of explicitly pro-white rhetoric and a rise in public displays of various formations of white supremacy, including the emergence of a loose group of disgruntled pro-white, far-right reactionaries who have strategically adopted the label of “alt-right.” To help make sense of articulations among “alt-right,” far-right, and pro-white ideologies in the Trump-era, this essay investigates the emergence and early evolution of the “alt-right” to reveal how appeals to intellectualism and political correctness have been deployed to make space for overtly pro-white rhetoric in mainstream U.S. American public dis-course. Along the way, I reveal (dis)connections among contemporary formations of pro-white ideologies to illuminate strategic constructions of rhetorical distance between these formations and white supremacy. Ultimately, I argue that “alt-right” rhetoric is positioned as a rhetorical bridge between white nationalism and mainstream public discourse. Keywords: Alt-Right, white nationalism, white supremacy, whiteness, critical rhetoric
Hello Darkness: Antisemitism and Rhetorical Silence in the “Trump Era”
Jamie Moshin
This essay investigates the simultaneously loud and silent rhetorics of antisemitism that have proliferated leading up to, and since the inception of, the Donald Trump presidency. How is it possible that discourse that seems so obvious, and so antithetical to US ideals, has managed to go either unnoticed or unremarked upon, or has been met with passionate support? The answers to this lie in the difficulty in ascribing authorial intent to silence, in the nebulous space of liminal Whiteness occupied by American Jews, and in Trump’s usage of five strategic rhetorical silences that signify antisemitism: literal; symbolic; dialogic; paraliptic; and dog-whistled. The essay concludes by discussing how the Trump campaign/Cabinet’s attempts to capitalize on White dispossession and utilization of “the radical flank” is helping both to normalize his antisemitic followers and to add to his appeal. Keywords: Jewishness, Antisemitism, Donald Trump, Rhetorical Silence, Dog-whistle
Trump, the KKK, and the Versatility of White Supremacy Rhetoric
James Chase Sanchez
This article theorizes the use of rhetorical versatility as a language tool for white supremacists in the age of Donald Trump, specifically referring to the ways Trump and the KKK speak to their various audiences through textual winks and polysemy. After demonstrating the recent rise of white supremacist groups in this country, rhetorical versatility is explored as way for rhetors to camouflage and signal their ideological viewpoints, which ultimately leads to an analysis of key terms and ideas that both the KKK and Trump utilize in the public sphere: “patriotism,” “heritage,” and “security.” Diving into the specific uses of these terms, this article pinpoints the textual winks that have constructed a civic version of white supremacy over the last few years. Ultimately, this analysis not only builds a theory of rhetorical versatility but also argues that we need more scholarship on the tacit forms of white supremacy. Keywords: white supremacy, Donald Trump, KKK, rhetorical versatility, textual winks, rhetorical climates
President Trump and Charlottesville: Uncivil Mourning and White Supremacy
Samuel Perry
This essay examines President Donald Trump’s responses to the tragic events in Charlottesville that took place on August 10 and 11 of 2017. It argues that Trump failed to fulfill his role as mourner-in-chief because he engaged in “uncivil mourning.” The essay establishes a theoretical framework for understanding mourning and then examines the three responses Trump gave after Heather Heyer was killed and others were injured by a white supremacist. It argues that rather than mourning Heyer or the values of protestors who confronted “Unite the Right” rally participants, Trump mourned the cultural erosion of whiteness. This follows a pattern well established in Trump’s speeches and tweets. Keywords: White supremacy, Mourning, Presidential rhetoric, Donald Trump
“Not White/Not Quite”: Racial/Ethnic Hybridity and the Rhetoric of the “Muslim Ban”
Stephanie L. Gomez
During the turmoil surrounding Executive Orders 13769 and 13780, colloquially known as President Donald Trump’s “Muslim bans,” discourse turned to who “counted” as someone allowed in the U.S. In this essay, I conduct a critical rhetorical analysis of tweets about the Muslim ban, using a theoretical framework of hybridity, in order to examine how hybridity was, and is, used to rhetorically position people as “acceptable” or “unacceptable” within the rubric of the law and the Muslim ban more specifically. I argue that hybridity is rhetorically articulated as malleable in order to suit the goals of white supremacy; race/ethnicity, religion, and nationality are both conflated and separated depending upon the specific goals and arguments put forth. Thus, racial/ethnic/religious/national identity is seen as both fluid and fixed, but all in service of shoring up discourses of whiteness and white supremacy. Keywords: white supremacy, Muslim ban, Trump, whiteness, racial/ethnic hybridity
Trump’s Warsaw Address, or How the “West” Was Widened
Rebecca M. Townsend
In his first major address in Europe, President Donald J. Trump relies upon visual and historical scenic elements to argue for battle in a clash of civilizations. In so doing, he broadens the notion of the “West,” which relies upon a purified perspective, one whitened and Christian. Using Burkeian rhetorical theory, this essay explores the War-saw address for its scenic development of identity as the location for this symbolic battle with material consequences. The address engages in a victimage ritual that united an oppositional interpretation of the physical locale, traces of President Kennedy’s Berlin Address, and retells parts of Polish history to support Poland’s right-wing government’s anti-immigrant and nationalist policies. Notable as well for its absences, the address fails to bolster democratic principles like the rule of law or the independence of a judiciary and instead amplifies white supremacist rhetoric. Keywords: Trump, Poland, West, scene, agency, victimage ritual, clash of civilization, white supremacy
How People Make Sense of Trump and Why It Matters for Racial Justice
Will Penman
Doug Cloud
Scholars, journalists, pundits and others have criticized the racist, anti-queer, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, and xenophobic rhetoric that pervades the Trump campaign and presidency. At the same time, commentators have ex-pended a vast number of words analyzing Trump’s character: why does he do the things he does? We ask, how do the latter (analyses of Trump’s character) help explain the former (Trump’s racist statements)? Through a close rhetorical analysis of 50 diverse examples of Trump criticism, we reveal four prevailing characterizations or “archetypes” of Trump: Trump the Acclaim-Seeker, Trump the Sick Man, Trump the Authoritarian, and Trump the Idiot. Each archetype explains Trump’s racism in a different way, with significant consequences for social critique. For example, the Trump the Idiot archetype dismisses his racist statements as a series of terrible gaffes, whereas Trump the Authoritarian explains them as an actualization of white supremacy. We trace the benefits and tradeoffs of each archetype for resisting white supremacy. Keywords: Donald Trump, white supremacy, identity, rhetoric, archetypes
Volume 7, Issue 4
Rhetorical Logic Bombs and Fragmented Online Publics of Vaccine Science
Miles C. Coleman
Vaccine denialists are commonly conceived as those who trade “internet articles” within their own “worlds.” Such fragmentation of publics is often regarded as a problem exacerbated by the technical features of the web (e.g., the algorithms of search engines and news aggregators) allowing people to avoid texts inharmonious to their already established worldviews. I make the point that such fragmentation is not simply a technical problem, solved by adding “diversity of texts,” exposing members of fragmented publics to new content, but also a rhetorical one, requiring adaptive engagement with the forms, and lines of argument, practiced between others’, and one’s own, publics. Rhetorical logic bombing is offered as the strategy of placing media within the common network of texts that constitutes a given fragmented public in order to “sneak in” a critique of the belief-structures of that public. Keywords: digital rhetoric, rhetoric of science and technology, vaccination, rhetorical logic bombs, networked publics
Strategic Silence as a Frame for Understanding the 2017 Embargo Against Qatar
William F. Harlow
In this essay, On June 5, 2017, a coalition of states led by Saudi Arabia announced an embargo against Qatar. Several of the states were fellow members of the Gulf Cooperation Council with Qatar, and the embargo was thus taken against a close ally. The reason given for the embargo was Qatari support of terrorism, but the public explanation did not detail what specific things the government in Doha had done. As the crisis unfolded, the Saudi-led coalition continued to provide no further details even as other plausible explanations circulated in the press. In this paper, I examine the coalition’s failure to communicate specifics as an act of strategic silence. Drawing from the scholarship on strategic silence, I also analyze the audience at whom the silence was intended and what goal the coalition hoped to achieve through its use. Keywords: Qatar, Gulf Cooperation Council, Saudi Arabia, embargo, strategic silence
Volume 7, Issue 2/3: Special Issue on Remix Rhetoric, edited by Lisa Horton and David Beard
From Medievalism to Memes: Editor’s Introduction to a Special Issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric
Lisa Horton
In introducing this special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric, this essay engages in four moves. First, I look at the Steampunk subculture as a case study in remix and a process of appropriation of historical culture. Then, in examining four invited essays, we produce the most current theoretical and critical frames for the study of remix. Then, introducing a series of essays submitted by scholars in communication, media studies, literary studies, and creative writing, we explore the sheer range of possibilities for the application of remix theory. Finally, I centralize remix as a viable language and, perhaps, a unifying rhetorical framework for discussing the surfeit of cultural variety presented by contemporary traditional and digital media. Keywords: fan culture, literary history, medievalism, remix theory, rhetoric, steampunk.
Remixing and Reconsidering Rhetorical Velocity
Jim Ridolfo and Dànielle Nicole DeVoss
In this essay, we will remix, revise, and reconsider the notion of rhetorical velocity, a concept Ridolfo first developed and which we wrote about in a 2009 piece. More specifically, we’ll return to the original construction of rhetorical velocity and examine its relationship to remix, then trace the increasing ubiquity of “remix” across the eight years since we first published the rhetorical velocity article in Kairos. We’ll address complexities of assessing authorship, investigating practices of composition, and interrogating recomposition and redistribution
— in the context of what Hart-Davidson and Ridolfo describe as “the fog of digital rhetoric.” We envision the manuscript as a mixture of reflection and analysis. Keywords: circulation, delivery, distribution, remix, rhetorical velocity.
Rhetoric and Remix: Reflections on Adorno’s Minima Moralia
Eduardo Navas
This essay is a reflection on my online project Minima Moralia Redux, which is a remix of Theodor Adorno’s book Minima Moralia. I discuss how I relied upon rhetorical principles to remix his work as a type of update for the time of network culture. I begin by providing a basic overview of my creative and critical approach, followed by how I see rhetoric and remix functioning. I continue to explain how I repurpose Adorno’s work as a selective remix. I conclude with a reflection on recurring questions about “originals” and “copies.” “Originals” and “copies” are two concepts that remain crucial in remix studies, which are closely linked to rhetoric as a foundational form of creative expression for all media. To reposition our relation to these two terms, I conclude by proposing repetition in terms of rhythmic loops as a means for creativity and criticism. I argue that all things in life repeat, and it is up to us to engage in an ongoing process of becoming in order to live historically. Keywords: creativity, Minima Moralia, originality, remix, Theodor Adorno.
Remixology: A Remix(ed) Rhetoric for the 21st Century
David J. Gunkel
Critical responses to remix have pulled in two seemingly opposite directions. On one side, there are the utopian plagiarists, copyleftists, and remix fans and prosumers who celebrate the practice as a new and original way for creating and distributing media content. On the opposing side, there are the detractors and critics. According to this group, the sampling and recombining of pre-existing material is nothing more than a cheap and easy way of recycling the work of others, perpetrated by what are arguably talentless hacks who really have nothing new to say. This essay does not choose sides in the existing remix debate but 1) deconstructs the shared assumptions and values mobilized by both sides and 2) synthesizes a new axiology that is designed to deal with and respond to the opportunities and challenges of the twenty-first century and beyond. Keywords: axiology, authorship, deconstruction, media, repetition, remix, simulation.
Remix in the Age of Trump
Virginia Kuhn
This essay argues for considering remix — defined as artifacts that employ the semiotic registers of word, sound and image — as an emergent and vital form of cultural expression and communication. After tracing the ways in which the Trump administration has appropriated the language of the liberal left, using strategies employed by those with progressive political agendas, the specific affordances of remix are highlighted. These features — its polyvocality, its embrace of history, its focus on medium specificity and its accessibility — are potentialities of the form, even as they are not always activated. Taking examples from recent documentary films that make extensive use of archival footage, I maintain that remix can aid communication across difference and contribute to media literacy. Keywords: digital argument, documentary film, media literacy, political debate, remix video, the fifth estate.
The Subversive Remix Rhetoric of Saved By The Bell Hooks
Kyle Larson
This article discusses Liz Laribee’s subversive remix rhetoric for her Tumblr blog, Saved by the bell hooks. Lari-bee’s mashup memes feature image stills from Saved by the Bell and direct quotes from bell hooks. These memes facilitate the uptake of feminist discourse through the use of popular media while subverting the assumptions of that media. Laribee therefore uses these subversive mashup memes for social critique. I also illustrate the evolution of Laribee’s practices for the mashup memes based on her reflections on the ethics of racial representation in her remix rhetoric. I conclude with implications for academics who wish to use academic theory in response to socio-political issues in public discourse. Keywords: activism, counterpublics, feminism, memes, remix.
“A Choice is Better than None, Mr. DeWitt. No Matter What the Outcome”: Remix and Genre Play in BioShock Infinite
Betsy Brey
The rhetorics of videogames share much with the rhetorics of remix: both meld, repurpose, and reinvent media for new purposes and audiences. In examining BioShock Infinite in terms of what Dustin Edwards refers to as genre remix, a multifaceted tension arises. Infinite’s story on choice and decision-making clashes with its remixed steam-punk genre. Throughout the game, the narrative calls attention to this juxtaposition, forming a playable message about player agency and control in videogames as a medium – a meta-argument made through remixing the genres at hand. The game’s rules and coding are indifferent to player choice, but the player’s interpretation is where decision comes alive, where the narrative produces meaning, and where remix challenges perception. Keywords: BioShock, genre, narrative, play, remix, video games.
Steampunk Remixing in the Classroom: Encouraging Student Engagement, Active Learn-ing, and Multi-Disciplinary Perspectives
Brittany Kerschner
By using Steampunk literature in the classroom, the students became educated and articulate learners, able to engage in a critical dialogue with their own cultural ideologies and values. Not only is Steampunk literature a useful pedagogical tool, it allows students to explore complicated social issues with critical discussion by providing a framework of revisionist history remixed with current cultural anxieties and contexts. Keywords: circulation, delivery, distribution, remix, rhetorical velocity.
Remix: Here, There, and Everywhere (or the Three Faces of Yoko Ono, “Remix Artist”)
John Logie
Yoko Ono is unusual in that she is a site of considerable activity in three distinct spaces where the term “remix” is in common use. This paper reviews her activity in these distinct remix spaces and examines the spaces for identifiable variations in the term’s resonances and meaning. First, the “here” of academia reflects academic conversations about remix and remix cultures that can be traced back to the mid 1990s. The second site is the site in which the general public first encountered the term “remix”— the “there” of music and music production. Within this space we pursue the shift from remix as a purely technical term occurring within the recording process to remix as an aesthetic term reflecting expanding and shifting aspirations for the composer of a remix. Finally, this paper will consider the “everywhere” of an Internet-based popular culture grounded in current social media. Keywords: bricolage, collage, mashup, remix, rhetoric.
Remix Racism: The Visual Politics of the “Alt-Right”
Derek Stanovsky
Making use of Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Freud’s notion of “repetition compulsion,” and contemporary remix theory, this essay examines the rise of the “alt-right,” the grafting of white supremacist ideas onto popular culture iconography, their migration into mainstream political discourse, as well as some anti-fascist uses of remix culture. Keywords: alt-right, anti-fascism, anti-Semitism, mechanical reproduction, racism, remix, repetition compulsion.
Snow White Remixed: Confronting Aesthetic Obsession and Race in Helen Oyeyemi’s Boy, Snow, Bird
Jackielee Derks
While the plots and settings of fairy tales have evolved through the efforts of adaptation, their protagonists still represent an unattainable standard of beauty. The women who grace the screens in Disney movies are evidence of an idealized version of white Eurocentric femininity. Snow White’s story is especially indebted to this ideal be-cause the plot’s main tension depends upon the protagonist’s appearance. In her “Snow White” retelling, Boy, Snow, Bird, Helen Oyeyemi interrogates the Eurocentric aesthetics portrayed by the traditional fairy tale protagonist by examining issues of race and gender during the Civil Rights era. Eduardo Navas’ remix theory provides a methodology for examining how Oyeyemi’s adaptation maintains the aura of the fairy tale while foregrounding the Snow White image. Instead of revising “Snow White” to produce a more female centered narrative, Oyeyemi’s text instead layers the fairy tale with a contemporary story to unsettle the racial and gender implications of the Grimm’s idealized female protagonist. Oyeyemi’s remixed Snow White reveals how the fairy tale ideal pervades the public consciousness and reinforces hegemonic discourse that ties race and gender to antiquated aesthetics. Keywords: Aesthetics; Boy, Snow, Bird; Oyeyemi; Race; Remix; Snow White.
Remixing Homer on the Postcolonial Frontier of Serenity
Scott Koski
With his space-western series Firefly and feature film Serenity, Joss Whedon is a 21st century master of the remix, the rhetorical process that adapts older material for contemporary uses. Employing this process further, looking back to ancient Greek notions concerning honor and remembrance found in the works of Homer’s and remixing them with postcolonial thought from theorists such as Franz Fanon and Gayatri Spivak, I argue we can better understand the motivations of the characters Whedon created. If remix theory represents a new way of looking to the language and cultural artifacts of the past to respond to the problems of the present, remixing Whedon with Homer reinforces the reasons behind postcolonial theory’s need to give voice to the marginalized and subjugated, powerfully illustrated in Serenity by the planet Miranda. Keywords: Firefly, Kleos, Native Intellectual, Postcolonial Theory, Remix Theory, SciFi, Serenity, Space-Western, Subaltern.
Amplificatio, Diminutio, and the Art of Making a Political Remix Video: What Classical Rhetoric Teaches Us About Contemporary Remix
Scott Haden Church
This essay explores the ways that rhetoric and remix have similar communicative purposes. By using rhetorical tools amplificatio and diminutio, both rhetoric and remix magnify or minimize particular elements of their respective texts in order to best persuade the audience. To explore this process, I conduct an analysis of the remixed vid-eo clip “Debate Night” by the creators of the popular YouTube channel Bad Lip Reading. This 2016 video features footage of two presidential candidates engaged in the first presidential debate, however it has been recontextualized as a fictional game show. This political remix is an example of diminutio, and particularly the rhetorical figure of tapinosis, because its remixed incarnation diminishes the overall importance of the original text and emphasizes the ambiguous separation between politics and entertainment. In essence, this analysis demonstrates how remix and rhetoric illuminate each other. Having an understanding of rhetoric helps us analyze remix to discover the ideologies behind the content, even for supposedly meaningless content like online entertainment. Likewise, having an understanding of remix helps us see innovative ways to use rhetorical principles to make sense of our media-saturated world. Keywords: amplificatio, diminutio, music, remix, rhetoric.
Marie de France Dreams of Steampunk
E. L. Risden
In two parts, this project demonstrates the creative energy of remix. First, the author creates a fictional remix of medievalism and steampunk, in which medieval author Marie de France, inspired by a “magical” tapestry, envisions a Victorian future of steam-engine trains and lace-collared romance. Then, the author provides a critical reflection on some theoretical aspects of remix and how they suggest productive ways to think about storytelling. Not an idea isolated to music or any other particular art, remix applies to nearly any artistic endeavor: the artistic process by its nature takes up elements from varied sources of inspiration to create something new, remixing the history of influences with the author’s own history of creative work. Keywords: fiction, literary history, medievalism, remix theory, steampunk.
Remixing Slumberland: An Afterward
David Beard
The author examines the anthology Little Nemo: Dream another Dream (Locust Moon Press) in light of the rhetorical remix theory of Scott Church. Winsor McCay’s early twentieth century comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland (in part) defined the visual language of comics as well as the visual language of dreams. In remixing Little Nemo in Slumberland, the creators in Dream another Dream produce a new language of dreams, one in which McCay’s work is visible, but which imagines a dreamscape constrained by the panels of comics and less inflected with the racism and orientalism of McCay’s 1905 vision. Keywords: Little Nemo in Slumberland, Remix, Rhetoric, Winsor McCay.
Volume 7, Issue 1
Remembering Jim Crow in the Age of Trump: An Analysis of the Rhetorical Functions of the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia
Christopher A. House
The first one hundred days of President Donald Trump’s rhetoric, controversial policies and executive orders sparked national protests and dialogue on race, racism and institutional racism. It has also stimulated conversation on the role and place of racist iconography and artifacts in the nation at a time when racial attacks and tensions are mounting. Using the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia (JCM) at Ferris State University as a case-study, this paper analyzes one way that racist images and artifacts are being used to create a more honest record of public memory that centers matters of race and culture within broader American cultural and historical memory of the Jim Crow period and in creating rhetorical spaces of dialogue that inspire social change. JCM is examined here as a counter-museum and open resource to the public that encourages visitor participation and dialogic analysis through a moral lens that challenges dominant discourses from the Trump administration and sites of public memory that employ either symbolic annihilation or trivialization/deflection as their main rhetorical strategies in depicting the legacy of America’s racial past. Key Words: Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, African Americans, racist artifacts, Donald Trump, David Pilgrim, rubbish theory, Repetition and difference theory.
Diverse Dominant Group Responses to Contemporary Co-Cultural Concerns: U.S. Intergroup Dynamics in the Trump Era
Mark P. Orbe
Colin J. Batten
This essay explores the rhetoric associated with a Trump era of U.S politics, one that has been described as “divisive politics of identity” (Rodrik, 2016). In particular, we analyze on-line comments offered by self-identified majority group members (e.g., white, heterosexual, Christian and/or male) in response to the fears and concerns of certain co-cultural groups (e.g., immigrants, refugees, women, people of color, LGBT persons). Our analysis of dominant group rhetoric reveals both unsupportive (endorsing Trump’s policy initiatives, ignoring one’s societal privilege, focusing on one’s own societal disadvantage, resisting majority group essentialization and dismissing and/or trivializing co-cultural concerns) and supportive messages (acknowledging the legitimacy of co-cultural concerns, recognizing one’s own privilege, challenging other dominant group members, and embracing the role of co-cultural ally). The essay concludes with a discussion of our findings and implications for future research. Key Words: dominant group, U.S. politics of identity, co-cultural theory, privilege, Donald Trump.
Monsters to Destroy? The Rhetorical Legacy of John Quincy Adams’ July 4th, 1821 Oration
Jason A. Edwards
This essay examines how the John Quincy Adams’s foreign policy maxim of “we do not go in search of monsters to destroy” has been appropriated in contemporary foreign policy, including the recent 2016 presidential campaign, arguing his aphorism are authorizing words that validate and ratify the positions of pundits, politicians, and policymakers of not only critics of U.S. foreign policy, but those who defend it. Mapping Quincy Adams’s aphorism allows us to explore the boundaries and direction of America’s role in the world and how it impacts America’s exceptionalist ethos. Key Words: American exceptionalism, John Quincy Adams, foreign policy rhetoric, America’s role in the world.
Volume 6, Issue 3/4
Civility and Academic Freedom: Extending the Conversation
Leland G. Spencer, Pamela M. Tyahur, & Jennifer A. Jackson
Recent rhetorical scholarship has focused on the definition of civility and the relationships among civility, freedom of speech, and academic freedom, with some scholars claiming that calls for civility always squelch academic freedom. Taking up the case of a student organization at a university campus as an exemplar, this article argues that in some contexts at least, we might fruitfully understand civility as a condition for academic freedom and freedom of speech rather than an obstacle to such freedom. Key Words: academic freedom, campus climate, civility, freedom of speech, student organizations.
Digital Demagogue: The Critical Candidacy of Donald J. Trump
Amy E. Mendes
Over the last several months, businessperson Donald Trump has taken the lead in the Republican primary race. His flamboyant personality and unusually aggressive speech has drawn much attention and criticism. Journalists and academics have posited that Trump’s rhetoric is that of a demagogue. This essay catalogues the existing definitions of demagoguery, examines how Trump’s rhetoric may qualify, and outlines some ways in which demagogues may function differently in a digital world. Key Words: digital demagogue, election, rhetoric, scapegoat, xenophobia.
Your Personal Economy: Rhetorics of Citizenship in Financial Planning Commercials
Blake Abbott
This essay analyzes advertisements for financial planning firms who offer their services to guide citizens to financial security. It examines the relationship between the compulsion to invest and our understanding of citizenship in the 21st century. It argues that financial planning ads emphasize a mode of citizenship best characterized by the ideograph . To understand citizenship, this essay analyzes three ad campaigns: E*TRADE’s famous commercials starring a baby recommending the company, Fidelity’s “Turn Here” ads, and Prudential Financial’s “Bring Your Challenges” ads starring Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert. It argues that the advertisements construct a representative picture of citizenship by casting financial planning as a mark of good citizenship. In doing so, the ads interpellate the citizen as both an independent “entrepreneur of himself or herself” and a financial infant — a novice helplessly dependent on the advisor for the right kind of help to construct a financial plan that will offer the greatest reward. Key Words: Advertisements, Citizenship, Financial Planning, Ideographs, Investment, Rhetoric.
Kaepernick’s Stand: Patriotism, Protest, and Professional Sports
Steve Martin and George F. McHendry, Jr.
This essay examines the public controversy that has followed Colin Kaepernick’s decision to sit or kneel during the national anthem, which is played before National Football League games. We examine public statements made by Kaepernick, and various rhetors who have defended him, arguing that two compelling defense strategies are present. Drawing from the genre of apologia, or speeches of defense, we argue that Kaepernick seeks to transcend his protest and focus on systemic racism and violence against people of color. Meanwhile, external defenders of Kaepernick seek to differentiate his protest from charges that he is unpatriotic. These efforts argue that Kaepernick has the right to protest, but avoid engagement with the content of the protest. Finally, we consider implications for rhetorical entanglements with Kaepernick’s protest to argue that most responses, ultimately, serve to reinforce the status quo. Key Words: Apologia, #blacklivesmatter, Colin Kaepernick, Image Restoration, National Anthem, NFL, Patriotism, Protest.
Reexamining the “Obama Effect”: How Barack Obama’s Rhetoric Spread Optimistic Colorblindness in an Age of Inequality
Lessie Branch
This article takes as its point of departure the paradox between increased optimism among Black Americans and continued socioeconomic stagnation among the same group. A 2010 poll conducted by Pew Research Center revealed that Blacks were more optimistic about their opportunities and progress as a group than socioeconomic data warrant. Black optimism has been attributed to the “Obama effect,” the view that the election of President Barack Obama in 2008 provided Black Americans with a sense that success is possible for Blacks in America. As recent as 2015 this optimism was as reported by The Atlantic and Brookings Institute as still in effect. In this article, I argue that the Obama effect is insufficient to explain paradoxical Black optimism. To explore the effect of Obama’s rhetoric on public opinion and Black optimism, especially among young Americans, I use critical discourse analysis to explore rhetorical messages of colorblindness and individualism in three of Obama’s speeches from 2008, 2012, and 2013. I conclude that the phenomenon of paradoxical Black optimism is correlated with elite Black discourse, as exemplified in Obama’s rhetoric during the three addresses. Key Words: African Americans, Barack Obama, Black Americans, Black Optimism, Critical Discourse Analysis, Elite Discourse, Socioeconomic Inequality.
The Rhetoric of Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory: Conflicting Visions of Innovation in the Smart Phone Patent Wars
Joshua Welsh
In this article, I investigate the rhetoric of Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (RAND) licensing agreements, which are used to share patented technologies. RAND agreements are an essential part of the so-called “Patent War” that took place between Microsoft, Google, and Motorola Mobility from 2010 to 2015. I view the rhetoric surrounding the RAND-related aspects of this conflict through two theoretical lenses: Charles Taylor’s concept of the social imaginary and Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca’s notion of rhetorical communion. Ultimately, I argue that the sides in this conflict use radically different rhetorical concepts to shape their discourse surrounding RAND agreements. These differences suggest different approaches to technological innovation. Microsoft’s use of social imaginaries suggests a view of innovation as collaboration among firms, while Google’s creation of rhetorical communion (especially through the device of allusion) depicts a view of innovation that is much more rooted in the notion of the inspired author. Key Words: Charles Taylor, Google, Intellectual Property, Licensing Agreements, Microsoft, Motorola, Patent Wars, Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca.
In this article, the author reflects on founding the Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric, its origins as part of the Alabama Communication Association, and his role as editor of the journal for six years. After considering some of the defining moments of the journal, the author considers how this past may shape the future of the journal as it moves on to the new editor. Key Words: association history, autoethnography, journal publishing, open access.
Volume 6, Issue 1/2
Empathizer-in-Chief: The Promotion and Performance of Empathy in the Speeches of Barack Obama
Eric Leake
Empathy has been a hallmark of Barack Obama’s rhetoric, from his initial run for president to recent speeches in South Carolina and in support of prison reform. In this essay I argue that Obama does more than attempt to present himself as a relatable empathizer who understands mainstream America, as previous politicians have done. I demonstrate instead through the analysis of key speeches that Obama actively promotes and performs empathy as a means of understanding and as a civic value, especially in his use of personal stories and the recognition of context and history. I conclude with a consideration of the power of empathic rhetoric for how it creates expectations of feeling and accountability. These expectations also open it to necessary critique. Key Words: accountability, empathy, “I feel your pain,” narrative, Obama, political rhetoric.
Coming Out as a Transgender Advocate: Laverne Cox, Intersectional Rhetoric, and Intersectionality
Andre Favors
In this essay, the author frames the public discourse of transgender performer and advocate Laverne Cox in terms of both its use of an intersectional perspective and the use of intersectional rhetoric. This analysis bridges these two approaches to illustrate that Cox has successfully shifted public discourse in terms of trans and queer issues, but also is able to build a broader coalition while doing so. As a performer, Cox’s work has complicated her advocacy work. However, Cox has built a successful approach that embraces both intersectional rhetoric and an intersectional perspective. Key Words: intersectionality, Laverne Cox, Netflix, transgender advocacy, queer of color rhetoric(s).
The Rhetoric of Race, Culture, and Identity: Rachel Dolezal as Co-Cultural Group Member
Mark P. Orbe
This essay analyzes the rhetoric of Rachel Dolezal, a biologically white woman who embraces a black cultural identity. Drawing from various mass-mediated texts, I draw on existing research on passing and co-cultural theory to provide insight into the rhetoric of race, culture, and identity surrounding the series of unfolding events of the summer of 2015 when Dolezal was “outed” as a white woman. Specifically, I argue that from her perspective, Dolezal understood her position in African American communities as one of cultural outsider which prompted various co-cultural communication orientations and practices geared toward specific preferred outcomes, namely accommodation and ultimately total assimilation. The essay concludes with a discussion on how Dolezal’s rheto-ric provides an excellent opportunity to explore issues of race, culture, and identity – an important element of the field of communication’s civic calling to use their expertise to engage important socio-cultural issues. Keywords: co-cultural theory, passing, post-racial, Rachel Dolezal, racial identity.
Audible Optics: Popular Music as a Public Relations Resource in Political Campaigns
Michael Warren Tumolo
This essay addresses how music is used by political campaigns as a strategic rhetorical tactic that I label audible optics. Audible optics are a variation of political “optics,” which are public relations practices designed to make a client’s cause appear in a positive light without attending to their substantive positions or character. This argument proceeds in two stages. The first section offers a theoretical framework dealing with issues of representation and iconicity that bear upon the explicit use of music by political campaigns. The second section offers a discussion of celebrity politics on stage. Keywords: Celebrity Politics, Iconicity, Lanham Act, Political Campaigns, Popular Music, Public Relations Optics.
Volume 5, Issue 3/4
Edward Snowden in Hong Kong: Transnationalism and the Local Deployment of Human Rights Tropes
Shui-yin Sharon Yam & Ling Yang
In 2013, Edward Snowden briefly sought refuge in Hong Kong after leaking classified information from the NSA. Linking Snowden’s act with their own local demands for democracy and civic rights, Hongkongers took to the street in support of Snowden and to condemn oppressive state governments—including mainland China. Snowden’s pres-ence, in other words, allowed Hongkongers to not only represent themselves as defenders of transnational of human rights, but also afforded them the legitimacy to argue against China’s oppressive policies that damage local politi-cal interests. This article analyzes protest signs and slogans from Hong Kong, and juxtaposes those artifacts with responses from the Chinese state government. Keywords: China, Citizenship, Edward Snowden, Hong Kong, Human Rights, Protest.
Special Issue on Rhetoric and Race, edited by Andre E. Johnson.
Understanding the Rhetoric(s) of Race
Andre E. Johnson
This essay provides an introduction to a special issue of Journal of Contemporary Rhetoric on rhetoric and race. This introduction provides a brief overview of the essays and provides some context for the issue. Keywords: Black Lives Matter (movement), race, religion, rhetoric
Black Lives Matter: Post-Nihilistic Freedom Dreams
Julius Bailey & David J. Leonard
Three simple words: Black. Lives. Matters. They have come to define a generation as the struggle against persistent violence and unmitigated racial terror. Visible across the nation, from mass demonstrations to social media timelines, Black Lives Matter as a rally cry exists alongside of daily evidence to the contrary. Images of protests wearing black lives matters shirts or hashtag protests appear alongside further proof of a nation’s disregard for black life. Coined by Aliza Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi, the mantra “Black Lives Matter” encapsulates the precarious position of black America in our supposedly post-racial movement. Representing a movement, a rhetorical signpost marking the persistence of racial violence, a challenge to white privilege, a sense of community, and an articulation of this generation’s “freedom dream,” “Black Lives Matter” is a complex articulation of our current moment. This paper takes up the meaning and significance of “Black Lives Matters,” arguing that it simultaneously embodies a Black Existentialism, which demands voice and autonomy in an “othering,” while at the time demands the basic rights of citizenship and humanity. Pushing back against the hegemony of Black nihilism within the 1980s and 1990s, “Black Lives Matters” imagines a future that exists apart and beyond white supremacy. Keywords: Activism; Black Existentialism; Black Love; #BlackLivesMatter; Freedom Dreams; Michael Brown; Nihilism; Trayvon Martin
#BlackLivesMatter: Epistemic Positioning, Challenges, and Possibilities
Catherine L. Langford & Montené Speight
The social media campaign #BlackLivesMatter presents an ideology counter to the historical and contemporary framing of African Americans that strips them of social value. The hashtag attempts to alter the epistemic paradigm that exists in American discursive and material actions by drawing attention to the habitual violence against Blacks in America while infusing a positive message about the individual and communal worth of Black lives. Black citizens are not aggressive, criminal, or inconvenient in the rhetorical construction of #BlackLivesMatter; Black lives should be celebrated and protected. Although multiple counter movements have arisen in an effort to invalidate the social critiques #BlackLivesMatter present, they are not successful. The hashtag teaches auditors the Black persons have a positive presence, that violence against the Black body is news, that white privilege exists, and that colorblind rhetoric does not help bring about equality or justice. Keywords: #BlackLivesMatter, Epistemology, Movement, Social Media, Violence
#AllLivesMatter as Post-Racial Rhetorical Strategy
Mark Orbe
#BlackLivesMatter was created following the acquittal of the man who killed Trayvon Martin; the movement’s call to action is against the “virulent anti-Black racism that permeates our society.” Shortly after #BlackLivesMatter became a nationally recognized symbol, it was re-configured, co-opted, and/or replaced by some with the more inclusive and racially neutral alternative, #AllLivesMatter. This analysis utilizes the core elements associated with a critical race theoretical frame to argue that #AllLivesMatter is akin with larger rhetorical devices — like the notion of a color-blind society — that are used to promote post-racism, something that was not possible with other political slogans during earlier civil rights struggles. Keywords: #AllLivesMatter, #BlackLivesMatter, colorblindness, critical race theory, post-racial, race, white privilege
The Hoodie and Other Protest Strategies Following the Death of Trayvon Martin: Conflicting Discourses of Social Change and White Privilege
Kristen Ann Hungerford
In the weeks following the death of Trayvon Martin, millions of people of all races and ages took to the streets and online to participate in the protests, “I am Trayvon Martin” and “Million Hoodie March.” These protests centered on issues of racial profiling and the non-arrest of George Zimmerman. In support of Martin, many protestors donned hoodies, made signs, rallied and marched, or protested with solidarity images on social media networks. In this essay, I examine how protestors identified with Martin and how race, as an identity category, functions in these different forms of protest rhetoric. There can be multiple readings of these protests, including the hoodie as a powerful symbol for social change. This analysis acknowledges such a reading, but ultimately argues that the rhetoric employed by the protestors does not represent unanimity/collectivity towards social change. The hoodie can be viewed as a potent symbol of protest, especially when worn by people who have or are at greater risk of experiencing racial injustice, especially profiling. However, when worn by white protestors, the wearing of the hoodie inadvertently provides a counter-productive rhetoric that diverts attention away from conversations of social change. I argue that by white protestors wearing hoodies, it unknowingly mocks and extends the notion of white privilege. Thus, these protests that began by Black Americans to further reiterate racial injustices are now largely embedded in unintentional colorblind ideologies. Keywords: Critical Memory, Incivility, Protest Rhetoric, Race, Symbols, Trayvon Martin, Whiteness
Barack Obama and the Paradox of Racial (In)Civility
Scott Anderson
On three occasions in his political career to date, Barack Obama has been called to address crisis in the form of racial unrest: during the 2008 presidential campaign in a speech titled “A More Perfect Union,” in 2013 following the verdict in the Trayvon Martin case, and after the 2014 grand jury decision in the Michael Brown case in Ferguson, Missouri. While most scholars credit Obama with an inclusive rhetorical strategy that ties Americans to shared values, analysis of Obama’s three racial moment speeches reveals his preference to contextualize race paradoxically, thus creating a type of disunity. In the context of civic controversy, I argue Obama’s use of paradox is fundamentally metaphorical and serves an important pedagogical function, which is to invite citizens to partake in what Michael Mendelson calls controversia, the process whereby speakers present both pro and contra reasoning within one complex argument to establish the grounds for deliberation. While this strategy may have contributed to Obama’s success in “A More Perfect Union” and in the Trayvon Martin speech, news media deemed his response to Michael Brown a failure. The success and failure of each speech, I argue, hinged primarily on the constraints surrounding each speaking occasion and its intended audience. Keywords: Barack Obama, civic controversy, metaphor, paradox, pedagogy
“You Go Out and Make Me Do It”: The Bully Pulpit and the Articulation of Black Pain
Andre E. Johnson
In this essay, I argue that Obama frames the killing of Trayvon Martin and the subsequent acquittal of George Zimmerman as a national tragedy and worthy of commemoration. In short, Obama articulates to the American people the pain that African Americans felt after the verdict and invites all Americans to mourn. Moreover, I suggest that by framing black pain at the center of this “American tragedy,” Obama invited all Americans to see “blackness” and its pain as part of the American fabric. However, I also argue that part of Obama’s about face had to do with the mounting pressure and protests from the people who took to the streets and social media to not only condemn the verdict, but also call Obama into question. Therefore, I examine the rhetoric of some of the protests and the calls for Obama to “do something.” Keywords: Barack Obama, George Zimmerman, Protest Rhetoric, Race, Racism, Trayvon Martin
“I Can Do For Me”: Race, Health, and the Rhetoric of Self-Love and Suffering
Kendra Hotz
This essay explores the relationship between the discourses of religious belonging and health care among African-American women in Memphis, Tennessee who participated in a diabetes intervention program at a faith-based community health provider. It focuses especially on their descriptions of how they discovered the importance of self-care, often expressed with the phrase “I can do for me.” I argue that the language and practices of biomedical contexts can work at cross purposes with the goal of encouraging good self-care, but that the insights of narrative medicine and womanist theology represent helpful correctives. This essay draws from womanist theology the concepts of surrogacy and self-love and from narrative medicine a method for cultivating in medical practitioners a capacity to appreciate the perspective of others. The central thesis of this essay, then, is that when we analyze the language of self-care using insights from womanist theology and narrative medicine, we discover the basis for a new way of construing the relationship between health seeker and health care provider that has the potential to disrupt the unconscious bias among health care providers that leads to disparities in treatment for racial and ethnic minorities. Keywords: Health Disparities, Narrative Medicine, Self-Care, Surrogacy, Womanist Theology
“The Most Dangerous Place for an African American is in the Womb”: Reproductive Health Disparities and Anti-Abortion Rhetoric
Amber Johnson & Kesha Morant Williams
This analysis focuses on the Life Always campaign that attacks Black women and deepens reproductive health disparities. Their anti-abortion billboard campaign adds to a body of discourse that stigmatizes Black women as promiscuous, irresponsible, psychologically immature, and murderers. Using critical rhetoric and visual textual analysis, we analyze the campaign alongside Life Always’ website in an effort to illuminate the hidden agenda behind the ads and the ramifications for those ads on the discourse surrounding African American women’s reproductive health disparities. We argue that if Life Always wants to change our nation’s ideologies concerning abortion, creating laws that attack Black women’s wombs is an ineffective and misdirected plan. We must create a new ideology that eliminates the pro-life/pro-choice dichotomy and instead promotes pro-health and reproductive justice. The terms Black and African American are used interchangeably in this study. Keywords: abortion, African American women, health disparities, pro-health, reproductive justice
If Womanist Rhetoricians Could Speak…
Kimberly Johnson
With all of the national debates about race and racism that discuss the killings of young black men by police officers, the excessive police force used on African American women, the Charleston Church Shooting by a white supremacist, and even our reactions to Bree Newsome removing a confederate flag from a state capitol building; we have heard from political pundits, social activists, religious leaders, some educators, and university administrators, but there is still an important voice that is missing. This article asks the question: where is the womanist critique? When will we hear and recognize a womanist voice in the midst of all the discourse? The article not only seeks to explain why womanist rhetoricians have been missing in action, it will begin to define womanist criticism and offer a womanist critique to the discourse on race and racism. Keywords: Race and Racism, Systemic Racism, Womanism, Womanist Criticism, Womanist Rhetoricians
Volume 5, Issue 1/2
Rhetorical Autoethnography
Brett Lunceford
Although autoethnography has been used in other fields, rhetorical scholars have been slow to embrace this methodology. However, a handful of examples of rhetorical criticism demonstrate how embracing the personal experiences of the critic and writing about those experiences can provide the reader with a greater understanding of rhetorical processes. This essay proposes some potential ways to connect rhetorical criticism and autoethnography by focusing on the role of emotion in rhetorical discourse and the role of the critic. The essay concludes with some broad guidelines for writing rhetorical autoethnography. Keywords: Autoethnography, Emotion, Narrative, Rhetoric, Rhetorical Criticism
Cyber-Storming the Castle
Brian J. Snee
This essay examines the controversy over the removal of a student newspaper adviser. The author traces the ways that the narrative put forth on social media by the previous adviser was taken up uncritically by other journalists. This case provides a cautionary tale concerning online journalistic practice. Keywords: Autoethnography, College Administration, Journalism, Twitter
Disaster and Memory: How the Tragic Erasure of Mnemonic Devices Affects Personal Memory
John H. Saunders
In this essay, the author explores the loss of ready access to memory through mnemonics in the aftermath of a fire which destroyed almost all of his possessions. He considers the ways in which physical objects serve as mnemonic devices that trigger memory, how we have trained ourselves to rely on them to index our memory, and how traumatic erasure of them irreversibly alters how we then access memory. Keywords: Autoethnography, Memory, Mnemonics, Trauma
Cultivating Community Through Academic Blogging
Lisa Glebatis Perks
Although academic publishing may seem a solitary exercise, this need not take place in a vacuum. This essay provides an example of one author’s attempt to create an online community through a blog describing her ongoing book project. She describes how individuals resisted her attempts to foster interaction on the site; instead, they interacted individually with the author across various media in a “hub-and-spoke pattern,” rather than with each other. Keywords: Academic Publishing, Autoethnography, Blogging, Constitutive Rhetoric
Say Yes to the Text
Jennifer Burg
In this essay, the author describes her experience as a participant in the reality television show Say Yes to the Dress. She delves into the production aspects of the show and her own feelings of identification with the production staff. She also considers the multiple audiences, both present and not present, in applying for, producing, and participating in a reality television show. Keywords: Audience, Autoethnography, Bridal Rituals, Femininity, Reality Television, Wedding Rituals
Volume 4, Issue 3/4
Gaming Citizenship: Video Games as Lessons in Civic Life
Amber Davisson and Danielle Gehm
Citizenship is a relationship between strangers who may have little in common beyond a shared geopolitical space. The strength of a citizenry is dependent, in part, on individuals who are able to envision the larger society, imagine themselves as part of it, and act on that sense of imagined connectedness. Media have long been resources for developing that imagination. This essay looks at the media format of video games to understand how the proceduralism in digital technology can function rhetorically by mimicking rituals of civic life and, in the process, commenting on those rituals. Video games use a combination of fictive worlds and concrete rules to argue for what it means to be a good citizen. Keywords: Citizenship, Fictive Worlds, Imagination, Procedural Rhetoric, Video Games
Volume 4, Issue 1/2
You Are What You Compute (and What is Computed For You): Considerations of Digital Rhetorical Identification
Aaron Hess
As digital technology becomes increasingly ubiquitous, it is necessary to rethink how our devices fundamentally alter the nature of identity. Using Burkean identification, this essay examines digital technology and its effect on the unconscious, argumentation, and public deliberation. I offer digital rhetorical identification as a process of technological unconscious consubstantiality, through which users are provided and believe in information and argument based upon their digital substance. In current digital contexts, the substance of the Internet user has been drastically affected by the use of Internet “cookies.” In tandem with server algorithms, cookies have become our “digital substance,” formed out of personal search history and directed by consumerist aims. Cookies filter information for users based upon previous searches and other details, while operating silently on our machines. Consequently, the online circulation of knowledge serves as an echo chamber of personal desire and opinion rather than giving users diverse perspectives. This effect bleeds into offline rhetorical practices, limiting the circulation of public knowledge and argument. Keywords: Communication Technology, Cookies, Deliberation, Digital Rhetoric, Facebook, Google, Identification.
The Rhetoric of Rogue Ethos: Chris Christie’s Swing from “Boss” to “Bully”
Jeffrey P. Mehltretter Drury
In the span of a year—from January 2013 to January 2014—public perception of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie shifted from viewing him as a “Boss” and rising GOP leader to a “Bully” and a vindictive politician. This essay explains this shift in approval through the concept of “rogue ethos,” loosely translated as rogue credibility, as it applies to Christie’s rhetorical responses to Hurricane Sandy relief and the George Washington Bridge scandal. I argue that Christie’s rhetoric provided conflicting constructions of his status as a leader. More precisely, Christie framed his response to Sandy relief from a moral standpoint of republican leadership while he framed his bridge scandal response from a personal, and hence selfish, vantage point that contradicted the earlier ethos. These two situations underscore the importance of community values undergirding rogue conduct and help theorize the risks of rogue ethos. Key Words: Chris Christie, rogue, ethos, political rhetoric, value appeals
Volume 3, Issue 3/4
“Kissing for Equality” and “Dining for Freedom”: Analyzing the Ego-Function of the August 2012 Chick-fil-A Demonstrations
Jill M. Weber
In August 2012, thousands of Americans traveled to their local Chick-fil-A restaurants to participate in the Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day and the National Same Sex Kiss Day, two demonstrations designed to show support and opposition, respectively, to the company’s public endorsement of the “biblical definition of the family unit.” This essay draws upon Richard B. Gregg’s theory of the ego-function to analyze the important persuasive functions the protests served for the participants involved. An analysis of the messages shared among members in the groups’ respective Facebook pages shows that the participants promoted a message of victimage, virtuousness, importance, strength, and unity. The participants in both groups disputed their opponents’ claims that they were “haters” or “bigots,” and instead portrayed themselves as righteous advocates for equality or freedom. The protests, then, not only functioned to show support for or anger at Dan Cathy and Chick-fil-A. They also empowered the participants and enhanced the legitimacy and importance of their respective causes. Keywords: Culture Wars, Ego-Function, Gay Rights, Protest Rhetoric, Same-Sex Marriage.
What to the US Catholic Bishops is the Fourth of July? A Rhetorical Analysis of Archbishop Lori’s Opening Homily and the “Fortnight for Freedom” Campaign
Christopher J. Oldenburg
“Fortnight for Freedom” was the first organized campaign directly appealing to Catholic laity that the US Catholic bishops developed since making religious freedom a lynchpin issue in 2012 election year. This essay is a micro-stylistic analysis of two principal rhetorical strategies employed by Archbishop of Baltimore William Lori in his opening homily. The homily’s central goal was to provide a rationale for the Catholic Church’s “Fortnight for Freedom” initiative by arguing for the conflation of religious freedom with personal political freedom, which I demonstrate ultimately failed. First, the archaic diction of “fortnight” reinforced unpopular perceptions of the Church’s Magisterium as antiquated and out of touch with the moral priorities of contemporary American Catholics. Secondly, false analogies in the form of enthymematic allusions erroneously compared opponents of the Health and Human Services’ contraception mandate to Catholic martyrs and President Obama to King Henry VIII. Keywords: Analogy, Archaisms, Fortnight for Freedom, Rhetoric, US Catholic Bishops
Volume 3, Issue 1/2
Sainthood as Rebuke: The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Strategic Canonization of Dorothy Day
Meaghan O’Keefe
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is pursuing an unpopular campaign to discipline American nuns who supported the Obama administration’s healthcare initiative. The campaign has boosted the nuns’ popularity and further damaged the Catholic hierarchy’s public image. In response, the bishops have adopted Dorothy Day’s sainthood cause as a means of regaining authority and of criticizing disobedient Catholics safely. The bishops shift the focus from present difficulties to their official role in the making of saints to bolster their authority. To persuade Catholics to support their campaign against birth control they reconfigure Dorothy Day as an exemplar of orthodox belief. Keywords: American Nuns, Bureaucracy, Canonization, Catholic Church, Safe Criticism, HHS Mandate, Prosopopoeia.
Uncivil Communication in Everyday Life: A Response to Benson’s “The Rhetoric of Civility.”
Shelley D. Lane and Helen McCourt
In his essay, “The Rhetoric of Civility: Power, Authenticity, and Democracy,” Thomas W. Benson focuses on uncivil communication in the political context. The purpose of the current article is to extend Benson’s characterization of civility and incivility beyond the realm of politics. Specifically, this article focuses on uncivil communication in everyday life and the rhetorical processes that underlie such occurrences. Everyday civil communication is characterized as that which is ethical and based on respect, restraint, and responsibility. Aristotle’s concept of ethos, Habermas’s ideas concerning universal pragmatics and communication competence, and Austin’s and Kaulfield’s characterization and application of speech act theory are used to explain instances of civil and uncivil communication. Everyday incivility is perceived as a serious societal problem that can be harmful to our mental, emotional, and physical well-being. Both civility in politics and civility in everyday life are governed by shared rhetorical norms that serve as guides for appropriate communication-related behavior. However, whereas political incivility tends to be deliberate and strategic, everyday incivility may be accidental and result from confusion about the rhetorical norms that influence perceptions of civility. Keywords: Civility, Communication Competence, Ethics, Ethos, Incivility, Millennials, Respect, Responsibility, Restraint, Rhetorical Norms, Social Media, Speech Acts, Universal Pragmatics.
Volume 2, Issue 3/4
Twitter Bites and Romney: Examining the Rhetorical Situation of the 2012 Presidential Election in 140 Characters
Janet Johnson
In 2008, Barack Obama revolutionized the digital campaign with Twitter and blogs. Now, in 2012, Twitter is a powerful venue for politicians, and Republican candidate Mitt Romney has used Twitter in an effort to disseminate effective messages to voters. For this study, I analyzed Romney’s tweets. From February 1 to May 31, 2012, his tweets build his credibility (ethos), express his reasoning (logos), and seek to emotionally connect with the audience (pathos), all by adapting to the rhetorical situation. Campaigns can examine and strengthen tweets to build a stronger connection with voters by communicating with them directly. Using Twitter bites rather than sound bites chosen by the media middleman allows politicians to give their readers a firsthand experience that other media cannot accomplish. Keywords: 2012 presidential campaign, Mitt Romney, new media, political rhetoric, social networks, Twitter.
A Postfeminist Apologia: Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s Evolving Response to the Planned Parenthood Controversy
Sarah Stone Watt
Susan G. Komen for the Cure made the decision in early 2012 to end its longstanding grant funding of Planned Parenthood on the heels of a controversial federal investigation into Planned Parenthood’s spending practices. This decision sparked a heated public debate over the politics of women’s health and highlighted a possible rift in the feminist movement. Komen CEO Nancy Brinker crafted an apologia for the controversy through a series of statements that emphasized Komen’s focus on financial responsibility above all else. In doing so, Brinker employed a postfeminist rhetorical strategy that highlighted the distance between Komen’s goals and those of the larger women’s health movement. Keywords: apologia, breast cancer, cause-related marketing, feminism, image repair, postfeminism, women’s health.
My Three Dads: The Rhetorical Construction of Fatherhood in the 2012 Republican Presidential Primary
Ann E. Burnette and Rebekah L. Fox
This essay examines the rhetorical constructions of fatherhood of three of the 2012 Republican presidential primary candidates. We analyze how Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney, and Rick Santorum personify fathers, both in the literal and figurative sense. We examine the candidates’ announcement speeches, the messages found on the candidates’ official websites, and the websites of the super PACS who support each candidate. These texts represent the most complete expression of their core identities. First, we evaluate each campaign’s rhetorical construction of the candidate as a literal father. Second, we analyze how each candidate assumes the persona of a metaphorical father to the nation and to future generations of Americans. Finally, we consider the power of fatherhood as a rhetorical strategy in the political sphere and the need to identify and challenge this hegemonic construct. Keywords: fatherhood, masculinity, 2012 Presidential political campaigns, 2012 Republican presidential primaries, rhetorical construction of gender.
Volume 2, Issue 2
Rhetoric and Religion in Contemporary Politics
Brett Lunceford
Abstract: The United States has long grappled with the question of how to maintain an appropriate combination of religion and politics in the public sphere. The current electoral cycle is no different, as Presidential candidates attempt to negotiate both the political and religious landscapes. This essay introduces a special forum on rhetoric and religion in contemporary politics and touches on some recent instances of how religious differences have played out in the current political environment. Some of the issues discussed include the separation of church and state, Mitt Romney’s membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), Rick Santorum’s conception of the “war on religion,” and the controversy over contraceptives at religious institutions and Rush Limbaugh’s attacks on a Georgetown law student. Keywords: Catholicism, Mitt Romney, Mormonism, Religion, Rick Santorum, Rush Limbaugh.
The Debate Confessional: Newt Gingrich, John King and Atoning for Past Sins
Joseph M. Valenzano, III and Jason A. Edwards
Abstract: Religious affiliation has always played a prominent role in the vetting of US presidential candidates, especially for those seeking the nomination of the Republican Party. Candidates within that party must appeal to fiscal, foreign policy and social conservatives, the last of which contain significant numbers of self-described evangelical Christians. During the 2012 Republican Presidential Primary appeals to these social conservatives became as significant a factor as any other with a Mormon candidate, a Catholic candidate who made his faith a centerpiece of his campaign, and a divorced former Speaker who recently converted to Catholicism. With the race still very much in the air, this former Speaker, Newt Gingrich, came under fire for his prior marriage and just a few days before a pivotal primary in South Carolina his ex-wife taped an interview about his marriage to her which was set to air immediately after the last debate before the election in South Carolina. At the beginning of the debate the moderator, John King of CNN, provided Gingrich an opportunity to discuss the pending interview. His response changed the scope of that primary election, helping vault Gingrich to a significant victory in South Carolina with significant support from formerly hesitant social conservatives. In this essay we examine his response to King’s opening question at the debate through the lens of image restoration theory and argue Gingrich used specific strategies to appeal for support from the social conservatives in that state. Keywords: Apologia, Image Restoration, Newt Gingrich, News Media, 2012 Campaign.
Will Mormonism Keep Mitt Romney out of the White House?
Larry Powell
Abstract: This paper examines the impact of Mitt Romney’s religious faith (Mormonism) on his chances of winning the presidency in 2012. Romney was unsuccessful in trying to neutralize the religion factor in 2008. His attempt to address the issue with a speech on his faith had no impact on the issue, and he was out of the race within two months afterwards. For the 2012 Republican primary, Romney took a different approach by ignoring his religious beliefs while addressing other issues. He was aided by a series of flawed primary opponents who unsuccessfully positioned themselves as viable contenders and who also ignored the Mormon issue. Still, Mormonism remains a point of vulnerability for Romney. Even though he was able to clinch the Republican nomination, many Americans still view Mormonism as a cult. Further, six of ten American voters still do not know about his Mormon faith. That factor could eventually hurt him in the November election, but he is also encumbered with other weaknesses that may play a bigger role in the general election. Keywords: Mitt Romney, Mormonism, Religion, Silence.
Avoiding Phony Religiosity: The Rhetorical Theology of Obama’s 2012 National Prayer Breakfast Address
Andre E. Johnson
Abstract: While scholarship of presidential rhetoric fill the landscape of rhetorical criticism, only recently has scholars given much attention to the use of religious rhetoric in presidential discourse. Moreover, while this scholarship is growing, scholars have not paid much attention to the National Prayer Breakfast. In this essay, I examine President Barack Obama’s 2012 National Prayer Breakfast Address as an example of rhetorical theology. I argue that during this address, Obama does more than fulfill a sacred obligation; he constructs a theology that challenges the prevailing public and political theology. Obama’s theology is not systematic, but profoundly rhetorical as he invites his audience to see and do faith differently. It is Obama’s framing of faith, grounded in religious values, that allows him to offer his policies—not as liberal ideology, but ones grounded in the faith. Keywords: Barack Obama, National Prayer Breakfast, Presidential Rhetoric, Theology.
Volume 2, Issue 1
Easy as 1, 2, 3: Rick Perry and Self-Deprecation as Image Restoration
David R. Dewberry & Rebekah Fox
Abstract: This paper argues that self-deprecation can be a strategy of image restoration. While image restoration is conceptualized as a goal-directed activity that seeks to maintain a favorable image, it would seem paradoxical that an individual would engage in a rhetorical practice directed at admonishing the self with humor. However, many politicians including Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and most recently, Rick Perry, have engaged in self-deprecation in response to their face. Consequently, it is imperative to recognize the rhetorical force of self-deprecation as an image restoration strategy. Keywords: Humor, Image, Rick Perry, Self-Depreciation.
A Candidate Commodified: Linda McMahon as a WWE Product in the 2010 Senate Campaign
Jefferson Walker
Abstract: This article examines the commodification of Linda McMahon, former CEO of World Wrestling Entertain-ment (WWE), in her 2010 campaign for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut. Much campaign discourse, including print media coverage and texts from both the candidate’s critics and allies, drew attention to McMahon’s wrestling background and constructed her experience in negative ways. Moreover, these multiple sources of discourse commodified McMahon as an actual and symbolic product of WWE. In addition, rhetoric produced by the campaign and WWE further promoted McMahon as a commodity “for sale” and marketed by the company in the context of the election. Through an examination of various forms of campaign discourse, this essay examines McMahon as a commodity of the WWE cipher. In a literal sense, this essay examines McMahon as a product of the WWE cipher alongside an assortment of commodities such as action figures, video games, t-shirts, and DVDs. In addition, this essay discusses McMahon as a symbolic product similar to concepts and ideals marketed by WWE, such as sex and violence. Keywords: Cipher, Commodification, Politics, Wrestling, WWE.
Volume 1, Issue 2
Contemporary Conservative Constructions of American Exceptionalism
Jason A. Edwards
Abstract: Ever since President Obama took office in 2009, there has been an underlying debate amongst politicians, pundits, and policymakers over America’s exceptionalist nature. American exceptionalism is one of the foundational myths of U.S. identity. While analyses of Barack Obama’s views on American exceptionalism are quite prominent, there has been little discussion of conservative rhetorical constructions of this important myth. In this essay, I seek to fill this gap by mapping prominent American conservatives’ rhetorical voice on American exceptionalism. Keywords: American Exceptionalism, Conservative Rhetoric, Jeremiad.
On Useful Rhetorical History
Michael Tumolo
Abstract: This essay addresses a recent critique of historical rhetorical scholarship and then argues for the use of history as a foundation for contemporary rhetorical scholarship. This essay offers an attitude towards history as a rhetorical perspective. Reflections on history from scholars including Friedrich Nietzsche, Maurice Halbwachs, Hayden White, and Walter Lippmann are used to indicate how historical narrative is required for relevant and timely scholarship, rhetorical or not. Keywords: History, Rhetorical Criticism.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s Strategies for Taking on Public Unions
Steve Martin
Abstract: Shortly after his inauguration, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker pushed for legislation to eliminate most collective bargaining rights of public workers (with the exception of firefighters and law enforcement) in Wisconsin. Walker argued that the move was needed to fix a budget crisis, even calling the legislation a “Budget Repair Bill,” but his opponents believed it was a union-busting effort. In his public discourse, Walker continually denied that the legislation was about unions. Refusing to negotiate with public unions and State Assembly Democrats, Walker instead appealed directly to the public, even going national with his speeches and interviews. An analysis of his discourse reveals that he used emotionally-charged appeals disguised as appeals to reason. First, he crafted a scapegoat for Wisconsin’s alleged budget problems: public workers. He further attempted to create divisions among different professions of public workers (teachers and firefighters, for instance) and between public union workers and other Wisconsin residents. Finally, he issued threats of mass lay-offs and firings if Assembly Democrats failed to allow a vote on the bill. Ultimately, Walker’s strategies disallow even discussion about a legitimate public policy question: what role should unions play in the public sector? Keywords: Collective Bargaining, Crisis Framing, Divide-and-Conquer, Labor Unions, Public Employees, Scapegoating, Scott Walker
Volume 1, Issue 1
Must We All Be Rhetorical Historians? On Relevance and Timeliness in Rhetorical Scholarship
Brett Lunceford
Abstract: Rhetorical scholarship, if it is to remain relevant, must be actively applied to current events. This essay proposes an alternate mode of scholarship, one that takes advantage of the online medium and integrates the speed of journalism with the rigors of scholarly analysis. Such a mode of scholarship dissemination is not meant to replace the current journal system; rather it serves a different end—that of providing scholarship to the public as a whole. I argue that scholarly analysis of current events will enrich the dialogue that is already taking place in the public sphere and help citizens to more fully take part in democratic practice.
Interrupting the Machine: Cynic Comedy in the “Rally for Sanity and/or Fear”
Ronald A. Placone and Michael Tumolo
Abstract: Political communication in the United States leaves a great deal to be desired in terms of compromise, rationality, and humility. Rather than lessening the difficulties, the era of 24-hour news makes matters worse by offering punditry in place of commentary while highlighting the issues that divide us rather than those that bring us together. Tensions came to a boiling point during the 2010 mid-term elections, which included overt racist and public violence. In this context, Comedians Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert created a satirical public rally, the “Rally for Sanity and/or Fear,” to draw attention to and provoke a meaningful response to the increasingly troubling political arena. To explain how the Stewart/Colbert rally functions as a form of social critique, we draw on the work of the ancient Cynic philosophers and on rhetorical theorist Kenneth Burke’s approach towards comedy. Keywords: Comedy, Satire, Cynics, Diogenes, Kenneth Burke, Jon Stewart, Steven Colbert, Daily Show.
The Rhetoric of Civility: Power, Authenticity, and Democracy
Thomas W. Benson
Abstract: Political crisis and conflict routinely produce rude talk and accusations of incivility. Civility and incivility are communicative, rhetorical practices. As such, they are always situational and contestable. Keywords: Civility, Democracy, Sarah Palin.
On the Rhetoric of Second Amendment Remedies
Brett Lunceford
Abstract: The current political landscape seems rife with partisanship and toxic rhetoric. Although this is certainly nothing new, there has been an increase in rhetoric that suggests that citizens take up arms against the government. In the wake of the shooting at a political rally held by Representative Gabrielle Giffords, the media began asking whether violent rhetoric could lead to violent acts and politicians began to call for greater civility in political discourse. This essay examines the rhetoric of Sarah Palin and Sharron Angle to explore the rhetorical implications of a worldview that deeply distrusts the government and considers armed insurrection as an appropriate corrective to a government run amok. Keywords: Civility, Sarah Palin, Second Amendment, Sharron Angle, Tea Party, Violent Rhetoric.