The Road to Becoming a Scholar: Post 1
For my first post, I would like to include. A small sample from an essay I submitted for my Modern Rhetoric course this semester. The full piece is approximately 25 pages, and one of the longest pieces I have written in my educational career. I also must say that this was one of the most enjoyable pieces I have written, despite how much work it took to produce. If you have any questions/comments, feel free to post, or if you would like to see more from this particular essay also leave a comment.
As I mentioned in my intro post, I will be including more posts like this in this particular blog as well as other articles I find interesting/compelling along with my insight on those. Additionally, I welcome any suggestions that align with my research interests.
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African American Rhetoric: Is there a Place for it in the Academy?
Christopher L. Thomas, MLS
Doctor of Philosophy Student in English
Old Dominion University
Fall 2020
Introduction
Language functions as an interesting structure when applying it to the Rhetoric and Composition discipline. It allows students and scholars alike to utilize these structures as a way to comment on the persuasive nature of language as well as what language does in a cultural, political, and rhetorical sense. Occasionally, one must operate outside of the norms of these structures to achieve their own rhetorical ends and agency. African American rhetoric is one of the structures that does just that. By manipulating the norms associated with Rhetoric and Composition studies, African American rhetoric shows ways in which these structures can be used as a way to both promote literacy practices in a particular culture, as well as use a wide variety of texts and other implements to demonstrate ways in which the culture wishes to exercise its rhetorical agency. While AAR focuses heavily on language, namely English and the ways in which African American scholars have used the language to both liberate and promote the cultural norms of the African American community. A structure that was once seen as oppressive was transformed as a structure of liberation.
This paper seeks to display these initiatives as it seeks to unpack some of the main forms and frameworks of AAR. It will lay out a historical grounding so that readers can follow the trajectory of the discipline, while going step-by-step through that which comprises African American rhetoric and how the discipline functions—and continues to function—inside the composition classroom and the pedagogical methods utilized in the classroom to ensure the viability of the discipline.
African American Rhetoric: Laying out the Historical Groundwork
In order to understand African American rhetoric (henceforth referred to as “AAR”) in its entirety, it is necessary to take a moment and step outside of the typical norms for the Rhetoric and Composition discipline. This is not to suggest, however, that AAR operates outside of the framework of Rhetoric and Composition, rather it manipulates the norms of the discipline to suit the needs of both African American scholars and students alike. One can almost think of African American rhetoric as an extension of Rhetoric and Composition which uses the same features of the discipline, manipulated in various ways to suit the needs of its users.
To gain a clear sense of what AAR is, how it is used, and the methods employed in the practice of the discipline, it is necessary to understand what rhetoric is. Interestingly, scholars have not settled on a hard and fast definition for the term, but most generally agree that rhetoric is “the art of persuasion.” This discipline utilizes language—both printed and spoken—as a means to persuade or call to action. In addition, the methods that are used to persuade an individual can be both printed (textual) or visual (pictures). It is impossible to sum up what rhetoric intends to do in a few sentences, but this description is here to give a basic framework for how rhetoric is expected to function, which will help contextualize AAR when it is discussed.
With this definition in mind, now a clearer picture can be created for what AAR is, in terms of a definition. Professors Keith Gilyard and Adam Banks have come up with a fairly succinct definition for the discipline in their co-authored text On African American Rhetoric. Both gentlemen are pioneers in the field of Rhetoric and Composition and have done an immense amount of work to support the efforts of AAR. They have defined African American rhetoric as “the art of persuasion fused with African American ways of knowing in attempts to achieve in public realms: personhood, dignity, and respect” (Gilyard and Banks 3). So that some sense can be made of this definition, one must pull it apart a bit, because not only does it utilize the conventional definition for what rhetoric is, it complicates that definition, by adding ways in which this method of persuasion is used to promote the efforts of African American citizens.
It is important to understand that African American rhetoricians exist in a similar space as their European counterparts, but what each attempt to achieve through the use of rhetoric are vastly different. With respect to AAR the persuasive initiatives are used to first give African Americans a sense of agency in a Eurocentric discipline. The persuasive strategies are then “fused” with African American knowledge-making strategies—and language ostensibly—to create a sense of “personhood” (identity) through various methods (textual and otherwise) to create space for African American scholars in the field of Rhetoric and Composition Studies.
This does not intend to suggest that Rhetoric and Composition excludes other groups, rather, other groups tend to use the discipline in different ways that suit their cultural needs. In the instance of African American students and scholars the discipline is used as a means of gaining agency and advancing the complex language—and knowledge making—practices of the culture.
Similarly, AAR uses a wide array of methods that may appear unconventional to the average rhetorician. As opposed to utilizing modern educational texts, AAR employs texts that speak to the experiences of African American students and scholars as well which represent the cultural and linguistic norms of African American individuals. Examples of some of the texts that are utilized in this discipline are slave narratives, folklore, essays, poetry, and various other cultural texts. Each of these texts contain elements of African American culture and each function in their own rhetorical capacity with their own rhetorical agencies. Even though these texts are seminal in terms of what they contribute to the rhetoric, the primary focus of AAR is the manipulation of language and how language is used to achieve rhetorical ends. Jacqueline Bacon and Glen McClish penned an article titled Reinventing the master’s Tools: Nineteenth-Century African American Literary Societies of Philadelphia and Rhetoric Education, which demonstrated not only how African American individuals used language as a means of rhetorical agency, but also as a way to promote and encourage literacy practices for African American students. This piece focuses heavily on the literacy practices of the nineteenth-century African American slave. Interestingly, language operated in a three-fold fashion: it functioned as a way to oppress the African American slaves, because most did not have command of the language, it functioned as a means of rebellion once they learned how to use the conventions of the language, and finally, it gave African American slaves a form of social, political and cultural agency. The fascinating element here is that a language structure, namely English, that was used as a way to prevent the African American of the nineteenth century from advancing him/herself could also be used as a method for that same individual that was oppressed by this language structure, to use this structure as a way to rebel against their master. The latter of which was the primary reason why there was such an initiative to prevent African Americans from learning the language, because once the language is learned then that would lead to forms of literacy, which would then empower African Americans to use that language against their masters.
Bacon and McClish also comment on the interesting paradox created here, because the language practices employed by the African American individuals juxtapose literacy and freedom. In order to gain a sense of freedom, one must possess some form of literacy. This helps to provide a historicization to AAR and demonstrate ways in which language can be manipulated to give a group of individuals rhetorical agency.
At this particular point, African American men and women were attempting to figure out ways in which to achieve literacy status. Some of the methods that were used to achieve these efforts included: reading rooms, libraries, and schools for African American children. Any way that books could come into contact with their hands. These documents help to provide familiarity with the language and provide a framework for protest, as Bacon and McClish indicate.
It was also discovered during the nineteenth century that African American female s created Literacy Associations. The purposes of these groups were for African American females to pass around books and then write critiques on the texts they read. This helped the women gain a stronger sense of the language and begin to translate this epistemology into textual form, despite the fact that the essays that were written on the texts were penned anonymously for obvious reasons. Additionally, speeches and other forms of oratory were published in the form of pamphlets and circulated. This helped to spread the messages and share the things that were discussed in these literacy groups. When focusing on the rhetorical traditions employed in oratory and the like, African American females relied heavily on the scholarship of Blair and his comments on taste and genius. These strategies provided for clearer and more precise communication, and the nineteenth century was one of the pivotal moments where information was available to determine the genesis of the African American rhetorical practices.
Bacon and McClish continue their argument to suggest that it was also in the nineteenth century that African American s were beginning to understand the conventions of rhetoric. Moving one’s audience was. A key component in rhetorical persuasion and that was the way to keep one’s audience in tune with the message. In other words, African Americans were learning Aristotelian appeals in addition to the scholarship of other prominent rhetoricians, and how they played an important role in one’s oratory and textual rhetoric as well.
The Nineteenth-Century Literacy Movement
From the nineteenth century forward, there were valiant efforts made with respect to African American literacy. William Whipper, a prominent African American thinker, created The Colored Reading Society, which was another organization that promoted reading and literacy efforts in African American communities. He was a prominent African American orator and delivered many speeches to groups of African Americans as ways to keep everyone informed and politically aware. Interestingly, his oratory was strongly influenced by the Scottish tradition as many African American scholars of this particular period (Bacon and McClish 3). He was extremely in tune with Scottish philosophy as well and attempted to pass along some of these conventions through his oratory. He was a firm believer in the notion that “education did not educate, rather it directed the faculties of the individual (Bacon and McCLish). This is an interesting notion, because when we think of education, the consensus is that we are learning something and that knowledge is being exchanged, but in a sense what Whipper is suggesting is that one is merely directed in the correct direction with respect to education as opposed to receiving some sort of information, which is particularly fascinating as it applied to the manipulation of literacy practices and rhetoric by African American scholars and students. This was a profound notion and transformed the ways in which others began to think about the way education was to function.
Whipper was heavily influenced by Blair as well and focused primarily on the notions of taste and eloquence in one’s writing and oratory. He felt that these two elements played a significant role in one’s rhetorical efficacy. In his opinion, rhetoric added the polish to one’s oratory or texts and Whipper attempted to employ these tactics in the production of African American texts of the nineteenth century and on. Whipper provides interesting contributions to the field and to African American scholarship and rhetoric, because at this particular time the focus was on gaining agency and distancing oneself from the frameworks that were used as oppressive structures—rhetoric, language and the like—but in order to advance one’s literacy practices as well as one’s writing/oratory, it was necessary to employ some of the same practices that African Americans tried so desperately to rebuke. It takes us back to how literacy and freedom were constantly juxtaposed and the notion that English both functioned as an oppressive framework as well as one that provided liberation at the same time. In addition, it demonstrates to members of the community how African American scholars were able to use this language structure that wa
The Postcolonial/Rhetoric Apprentice 