Without Content: Rhetoric, American Anarchism, And The End(s) Of Radical Politics

<p>My study suggests there is a homology between the Platonic critique of rhetoric and the critique of anarchism made by both Marxism and liberalism. I investigate this problematic by taking up a genealogical examination of anarchism in America that begins with America's founding and concludes with a discussion of the resurgence of populist/anti-Statist rhetoric(s) in the early twenty-first century. In doing so, I argue that anarchism is a politics "without content;" it is a rhetorical politics that challenges the (re)turns to metaphysics and Marxism in the wake of poststructuralist and postmodern thought. Specifically, in light of the contemporary Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street movements, I develop what I call "anarchic rhetoric," and suggest that rhetoricians, critical theorists, and those on the Left would do well to look beyond the dialectical and State-based models of communicative interaction that undergird metaphysics and Marxism to the "anarchistic" facets of rhetoric, which includes an emphasis on the affective, aesthetic, and non-teleological.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Open Access Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English

Year dc:date.available

2013

Author dc:creator

• Ristich, Michael John

Contributors dc:contributor

• Jeff Pruchnic

• American radicalism
• anarchism
• critical theory
• radicalism
• rhetoric

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/oa_dissertations/691

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.wayne.edu:oa_dissertations-1690