Participation Type
Paper
Session Title
Session 7.03 Activism and Organizing
Presentation #1 Title
Appalachian Rhetorics of Resistance: Toward Environmental Justice in the Mountains
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
When we acknowledge that with the authority to speak comes the power to define and to shape knowledge formation, we understand what is at stake for Appalachians in the realm of rhetoric, public space, and civic engagement. Since ancient Greece, the study of rhetoric has been tied to civic life and civic discourse, including—significantly—civic resistance. As Sharon Crowley reminds us, rhetoric as consensus-building, meaning-making, and the catalyst to action (persuasion) functions as the lifeblood of democracy. As such, this presentation examines the ways in which Appalachian grassroots activists contribute to such environmental calls to action through rhetorical means. In “Appalachian Rhetorics of Resistance: Toward Environmental Justice in the Mountains, ” I trace how regional activist organizations, such as Mountain Justice (http://mountainjustice.org/index.php), employ a pedagogical approach to popular education that demonstrates what Susan Kates identifies as “activist rhetorical instruction”: an awareness of the relationship between language and identity, class-conscious and politically aware writing and speaking, and an emphasis on community service and social responsibility (2-3). I focus in particular on activist movements against mountain-top removal in Appalachia. And in doing so, I look to the ways in which progressive rhetorical practice, particularly as delivered digitally and via social media, moves to make explicit the relationship between rhetorical performance and civic action. Increasingly, new media dictates the means by which we consume, interact with, and create cultural knowledge. Though virtual, cyberspace is a place where hegemonic struggles for representation and naming have real consequences for people’s lives. In the context of “new Appalachia,” it is therefore essential that citizens are able to maneuver within this new rhetorical realm and use its affordances not only to disrupt the inequitable structures that are reproduced within new media environments, but also to create new discourses that enable new meanings and representations. As activist enterprises that engage in such substantive meaning-making processes, organizations like Mountain Justice demonstrate such rhetorical practice in action.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Wendy Olson is Associate Professor and Director of Composition at Washington State University Vancouver, where she teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in composition, rhetoric, and American Studies.
Appalachian Rhetorics of Resistance: Toward Environmental Justice in the Mountains
Drinko Library 138
When we acknowledge that with the authority to speak comes the power to define and to shape knowledge formation, we understand what is at stake for Appalachians in the realm of rhetoric, public space, and civic engagement. Since ancient Greece, the study of rhetoric has been tied to civic life and civic discourse, including—significantly—civic resistance. As Sharon Crowley reminds us, rhetoric as consensus-building, meaning-making, and the catalyst to action (persuasion) functions as the lifeblood of democracy. As such, this presentation examines the ways in which Appalachian grassroots activists contribute to such environmental calls to action through rhetorical means. In “Appalachian Rhetorics of Resistance: Toward Environmental Justice in the Mountains, ” I trace how regional activist organizations, such as Mountain Justice (http://mountainjustice.org/index.php), employ a pedagogical approach to popular education that demonstrates what Susan Kates identifies as “activist rhetorical instruction”: an awareness of the relationship between language and identity, class-conscious and politically aware writing and speaking, and an emphasis on community service and social responsibility (2-3). I focus in particular on activist movements against mountain-top removal in Appalachia. And in doing so, I look to the ways in which progressive rhetorical practice, particularly as delivered digitally and via social media, moves to make explicit the relationship between rhetorical performance and civic action. Increasingly, new media dictates the means by which we consume, interact with, and create cultural knowledge. Though virtual, cyberspace is a place where hegemonic struggles for representation and naming have real consequences for people’s lives. In the context of “new Appalachia,” it is therefore essential that citizens are able to maneuver within this new rhetorical realm and use its affordances not only to disrupt the inequitable structures that are reproduced within new media environments, but also to create new discourses that enable new meanings and representations. As activist enterprises that engage in such substantive meaning-making processes, organizations like Mountain Justice demonstrate such rhetorical practice in action.
