University of New Mexico
Case Not Closed: Whiteness and the Rhetorical Genres of Freedom Summer
Abstract
dc:description.abstractThis dissertation examines the role of whiteness and its relationship to identification in rhetorical representations of the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer Project. Texts examined at length include recruitment materials, media coverage, pamphlets, and letters produced during the project, as well as retrospective representations of Freedom Summer in popular films and literature. Drawing upon Walter Beales pragmatic theory of rhetoric and Krista Ratcliffe's concept of rhetorical listening, it analyzes five perspectives on the hundreds of volunteers, most of whom were white college students, who traveled to black communities across Mississippi that summer in order to register voters, teach in Freedom Schools, work in community centers, and engage in other special projects. Analyzing the perspectives of white volunteers, black activists, white southerners, national media, and history, this dissertation reveals that the volunteers are variously constructed as admiring outsiders, neo-abolitionists, pseudo-scientists, community members, critical pedagogues, cherished children of the privileged classes, communist invaders, soldiers, missionaries, inconsequential extras, and catalysts for critical reflection. It concludes by suggesting ways in which contemporary teachers of rhetoric and composition might use selected Freedom Summer texts in the classroom in order to generate conversations about topics such as community engagement, interracial advocacy, and college students' writerly agency.'
Degree
thesis:*- Name thesis:degree_name
- English
- Level thesis:degree_level
- Doctoral
- Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
- English
- Year dc:date.available
- 2014
Author and committee
dc:creator, dc:contributor.*- Author dc:creator
-
- Ives, Lindsey
- Contributors dc:contributor
-
- Kells, Michelle Hall
- Matthews, Kadeshia L.
- Paine, Chuck
- Martin, Jamal
- Ratcliffe, Krista
Subjects
dc:subject × 5Rights
- Language dc:language
- English
Identifiers
dc:identifier.*- OAI identifier oai:identifier
- oai:digitalrepository.unm.edu:engl_etds-1025