Discourses of Stability and Change: Critical Rhetorics of Race

Session Submission Type: Panel Discussion

Abstract

Consistent with the convention theme to examine discourses of stability and change, this panel offers a roundtable discussion of studies conducted for a forthcoming volume, Critical Rhetorics of Race (edited by Professors Lacy and Ono), published by NYU Press. The volume exposes how racialized discourse emerges to create, reproduce and subvert cultural power, interpretations and knowledge. Communication scholars from a variety of perspectives will share their insights, and interrogate the conceptual problems and discursive practices (e.g., whiteness, antiblack racism, black masculine heterosexism, postcolonial identity formations, vernacular discourse and resistance rhetoric) in various contexts, such as press coverage (of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the Columbine and Virginia Tech shootings, and the Minute Men controversy), internet discourse (e.g., Stormfront), television shows, popular films (e.g., Crash and Quentin Tarantino films), pedagogical performances and others. The panelists will discuss their research, ideas for future research, and the constraints and possibilities for social change, antiracism, reconciliation and social justice. They will also discuss the role that communication scholarship plays in such endeavors.

Sub Unit

• Rhetorical and Communication Theory Division

Chairs

• Michael Lacy, DePaul University

• Kent Ono, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Presenters

• Aimee Carrillo Rowe, University of Iowa

• Bernadette Calafell, University of Denver

• Kathleen Haspel, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ

• Jamie Moshin, University of Washington

• Kimberlee Perez, Arizona State University

• Michelle Holling, California State University, San Marcos

• Thomas Nakayama, Northeastern University

• Rachel Griffin, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale

• Ronald Jackson II, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

• Sheena Malhotra, California State University, Northridge

• Catherine Squires, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

Session Organizer

• Michael Lacy, DePaul University