Identity & Subjectivity

Question 1

Constitutive Rhetoric

Answer 1

• Rhetorical discourse that attempts to form an identity for an audience at the same time as persuading it
• Offers a narrative to demonstrate that identity.
• Warrants action in the name of that identity.
• The activity and art of constituting character, community, and culture in language.

Question 2

Characteristics of Constitutive Rhetoric

Answer 2

• Generally uses rhetoric (language, symbols) to help form collectivities to help found a nation (Declaration of Independence), organization,
• To give rise to and maintain social movements (Carmichael’s Black Power speech),
• To form and strengthen political campaigns

Question 3

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric

Answer 3

• Focus: critic analyzes texts where constituting of an audience is likely to occur
  a) Constitutions, war proclamations, manifestos, social movements, etc.

Things to Look For:

• Paradox of address
• Subject position
• Narratives
• Naming of Self
• Value and Attitude Appeals

Question 4

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric: Paradox of address

Answer 4

Audiences are addressed as if their identities had already existed

Question 5

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric: Subject position

Answer 5

As that identity group, how is the audience being called to act?

Question 6

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric: Narratives

Answer 6

Who is the collective? Look for the story that connects with the narrative construction.

Question 7

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric: Naming of Self

Answer 7

What do they believe their position is in relation to the collective? (outsiders/insiders/friends)

Question 8

Analyzing Constitutive Rhetoric: Values and Attitude Appeals

Answer 8

What values do we associate with the collective?

Question 9

Identity definition

Answer 9

a person’s conception of self that is shaped by history, context, and one’s relationships

Question 10

Range of Identities

Answer 10

• Visible/Salient
• Situational
• Invisible/Hidden

Question 11

Identities: Visible/Salient

Answer 11

Things that are always in our mind that we are aware of

- Ex: gender identity

Question 12

Identities: Situational

Answer 12

Things that can be visible in our minds in some situations while not in others
- Ex: You don’t think about being American until you step out of the country.

Question 13

Identities: Invisible/Hidden

Answer 13

Things we are not aware of that are in a place where we have the most privilege, where we are considered the norm.
- Ex: Being your own witness

Question 14

Identity through Interaction: Ascription

Answer 14

• We’re ascribed and given identities by society/social construct

Question 15

Identity through Interaction: Avowal

Answer 15

• Self-prescribed identities, how we perceive and name ourselves, we gain a sense of who we are
• Ex: queer- having gender binary

Question 16

Identity is…

Answer 16

shaped through interaction

• Ascription
• Avowal
• Moments of being misnamed or misidentified can be challenging personally.

Question 17

Identity is.. (4 things)

Answer 17

• Multiple
• Intersectional
• Unstable & Uncontested
• Political

Question 18

Identity: Multiple

Answer 18

we have multiple identities

• Ex: Allegiance with US and Sudan
• We have multiple affiliations

Question 19

Identity: Intersectional

Answer 19

multiple aspects of identity come together to form something different from the individual parts

• All the different aspects of your identity you cannot separate without creating a new identity
• Ex: I am a woman and I am white.

Question 20

Identity: Unstable & Uncontested

Answer 20

• Identities are changing throughout our lives, with age

- There’s tension, categories are unstable

Question 21

Identity: Political

Answer 21

• Deciding how we identify and how we don’t identify have the same definitions
• Identities, labels, and definitions demonstrate our political committment