Call me crazy but I find it extremely ironic that
rhetorical studies is being challenged by a bunch of white men in power
regarding white men in power from the past and present! I just read pages of
these rhetoricians ideas of how not to essentialize, or at least to do so
strategically, to resist hegemony or “to conduct an ‘ascending analysis of
power’ Foucault, 1980, p. 99)” of the writer’s own discourse (Shome 597).
It is suggested that these rhetoricians can try to
unlearn the rhetorical tradition as Spivak suggests but most people do not just
forget what they know. Also soul searching to figure out why the discipline is
so white is recommended but this would only work for those who recognize there
truly is a problem and then still they would have to try and understand or
interpret how their actions played a major part in the problem. They would need
to recognize the fact that they could empathize but never sympathize with those
who are marginalized.
The rhetorical field needs to study all discourses not
just the west and make a conscious effort to investigate and learn about other
races and cultures. Only then will rhetoricians be able to attempt soul
searching with eyes wide open and accept other views outside of the rhetorical
tradition.
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