Rhetoric After Identification
Essays on Burke, Difference, and Acting Together
Will be published approx. on 10. December 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
288 pages
978-1-64336-703-3 (ISBN)
Description
How can we act together when identification may no longer bridge the divide?
Since the publication of Kenneth Burke's A Rhetoric of Motives (1950), identification has been the central concept of rhetorical theory. Rhetoric After Identification offers new theoretical frameworks for engaging with and letting go of identification-to see difference as dignity and consider how we are never fully understandable to one another yet can work toward making worlds in common. The volume confronts the primacy of identification through a variety of interdisciplinary lenses, drawing on affect and body studies, new materialisms, and decolonial philosophies. Challenging the assumption that identifying with one another is necessary to cooperation, contributors interrogate how the pursuit of "sameness" can perpetuate inequalities. In doing so, they do not abandon the potential for affective and symbolic identification; instead, they multiply the generative force of difference.
Contributors: Matthew Brigham, Catherine Chaput, Donovan Conley, Diane Davis, Matthew Halm, Chris Ingraham, J. G. Izaguirre III, Chris Mays, Kaden Milliren, Megan Poole, Krista Ratcliffe
Since the publication of Kenneth Burke's A Rhetoric of Motives (1950), identification has been the central concept of rhetorical theory. Rhetoric After Identification offers new theoretical frameworks for engaging with and letting go of identification-to see difference as dignity and consider how we are never fully understandable to one another yet can work toward making worlds in common. The volume confronts the primacy of identification through a variety of interdisciplinary lenses, drawing on affect and body studies, new materialisms, and decolonial philosophies. Challenging the assumption that identifying with one another is necessary to cooperation, contributors interrogate how the pursuit of "sameness" can perpetuate inequalities. In doing so, they do not abandon the potential for affective and symbolic identification; instead, they multiply the generative force of difference.
Contributors: Matthew Brigham, Catherine Chaput, Donovan Conley, Diane Davis, Matthew Halm, Chris Ingraham, J. G. Izaguirre III, Chris Mays, Kaden Milliren, Megan Poole, Krista Ratcliffe
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
South Carolina
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Unsewn / adhesive bound
Illustrations
3 Halftones, black and white
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-64336-703-3 (9781643367033)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
David R. Gruber is associate professor of communication at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He is the author of Splat: On Throwing Things and the Messy Politics of Material Protest.
Jason Kalin is associate professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, & Discourse at DePaul University. He has published in Rhetoric Society Quarterly, Philosophy & Rhetoric, and Visual Communication Quarterly, among other journals.
Jason Kalin is associate professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, & Discourse at DePaul University. He has published in Rhetoric Society Quarterly, Philosophy & Rhetoric, and Visual Communication Quarterly, among other journals.