UCI Rhetoric

Rhetoric Reading Group 2015-2016

In AY 2015-2016, the reading group discussions were united under the theme of Rhetoric and Activism (And What They Mean for Pedagogy). The theme created a space and an opportunity for us to reflect together on our roles as academics and as pedagogues in the midst of complex conversations in our country and around the world about race, gender, immigration, policing, violence, civic participation, and more. Alongside professional conferences on “Rhetoric and Change” (RSA ’16) and “Writing Strategies for Action” (CCCC ’16), the theme encouraged us to look locally at issues related to rhetoric, activism, and teaching that were also resonating on the national level.

Our first discussion on October 28th involved the following:

  • “The Mt. Oread Manifesto on Rhetorical Education 2013.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 44.1 (2014).
  • Happe, Kelly E. “Parrhēsia, Biopolitics, and Occupy.” Philosophy and Rhetoric 48.1 (2015).
  • Haskins, Ekaterina V. “Places of Protest in Putin’s Russia: Pussy Riot’s Punk Prayer and Show Trial.” Advances in the History of Rhetoric 18.2 (2015).

During our first discussion, the reading group wrestled with Happe’s biopolitical framework for interpreting the (arguably) rhetorical action of OWS protesters and with Haskins’ layered analysis of Pussy Riot’s place-based activism. As both Happe and Haskins challenge dominant narratives about the protest actions they study, we considered the extent to which the readings provide ways to comprehend the telos, or the purpose, of such actions. At the same time, we explored the possibility of activist work which refuses to name demands, which communicates its meaning/message through its becoming — a sort of phenomenological activism. In response to the Mt. Oread Manifesto, we contemplated what connection, if any, could be made between educating citizens and educating activists, and we reminisced about the institutional history of rhetorical studies and the distinct functions journals and conferences play in disciplinary politics.

On February 16th, at our second meeting of the school year, we introduced the following readings to the mix:

  • Butler, Judith. “We the People–Thoughts on Freedom of Assembly.” Notes Towards a Performative Theory of Assembly. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2015. 154-192.
  • Dewey, John. Selected excerpts. Democracy and Education. 1916. Retrieved from Project Gutenberg’s eBook (2008).

Our discussion took us to places we could never have anticipated, namely into Beyonce’s controversial (or controversially uncontroversial) performance at the Super Bowl halftime show. As we grappled with the questions to which Butler’s dialogic chapter might respond and with the importance of physical presence in Butler’s definition of embodied, enacted assembly, we debated the extent to which Beyonce’s citational and performative (and commercial and spectacular) halftime show might be doing political or pre-political work. Ultimately, while some were thoroughly unconvinced, others found the link to pop culture productive. Dewey’s 100-year-old Democracy and Education wove through our discussion in surprising ways, prompting us to consider how popular events  might constitute our shared culture and thus shared learning environments across differences. We discussed, too, how the lofty aims of pragmatism and progressivism articulated by Dewey work and don’t work in our contemporary contexts and pedagogies.

We convened on April 15th for our final meeting to discuss:

  • Acosta, Abraham. “Hinging on Exclusion and Exception: Bare Life, the US/Mexico Border, and Los que nunca llegarán.” Social Text 113 30.4 (2012).
  • DeChaine, D. Robert. “Bordering the Civic Imaginary: Alienization, Fence Logic, and the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 95.1 (2009).
  • Yeselson, Richard. “The Return of the 1920s.” The Atlantic. 30 December 2015.

Striking up a conversation about borders, bordering, and bodies, we found ourselves interested in the “slides” and “stickiness” — figurative, affective, signifying, and otherwise — that animate political discourse. Acosta’s article, which centers on an analysis of Luis Alberto Urrea’s The Devil’s Highway, permitted reflection on the limitations of narrative, as well as a consideration of the place of Gloria Anzaldúa in the rhet/comp and writing studies canons. We pushed back on DeChaine’s conclusion regarding the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, as some of us questioned his claim that the MCDC aims to mask their racism by invoking liberal democratic values. That discussion prompted an interrogation of “liberal democratic values” more broadly. Casting back to our first discussion of the year, we wondered what an emplaced and/or embodied analysis of MCDC activism might reveal. We returned often to the 2016 presidential race for examples of how borders, bordering, and bodies are implicated in discursive and affective ecologies. We concluded with a lengthy discussion about the emergence of affect studies in rhet/comp and writing studies, and we reflected on the all-too simplistic distinctions that often arise when historicizing the field’s various turns.

We hosted Unruly Rhetorics: Conversations about Activism and Pedagogy in May 2016, an all-day event featuring lectures by Nancy Welch and Paula Mathieu that served as the culmination for our AY 2015-2016 reading group.

Banner photo credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studios.