Distributed Feminist Rhetorical Agency after a Rape Accusation

This article examines the rhetorical effects of a rape accusation on the survivor and on the survivor’s community of social justice activists. Relying on interviews with the survivor and with the community affected by the allegation, the article analyzes responses to the allegation, articulates how those responses are informed by rape culture, and illustrates how those responses affected the survivor and her rhetorical agency. The article argues that rhetorical agency can be productively distributed across various allies to assist survivors and help restore the rhetorical agency that rape erodes. Establishing sexual assault as a public health issue, the article recommends broad education in rhetorical listening to improve how those entrusted to hear assault stories listen, respond, and, when appropriate, help survivors speak or act.

An Ethics-of-Care Paradigm in Opposition Research

This paper explores how I navigated the complicated terrain of opposition research during the dissertation phase of my doctoral program. Drawing from ethnographic research conducted on a pro-life organization, I illustrate that care-based ethics (Held, 2006; Tronto, 1994) is not just for vulnerable and agreeable participants but is valuable and appropriate for researching powerful groups whom we oppose. Furthermore, I argue that rhetorical listening (Glenn & Ratcliffe, 2011; Ratcliffe, 1999, Ratcliffe, 2005) is not just a valuable methodological approach to research, but also a form of reciprocity, especially critical when studying groups we oppose. Such an approach promotes the mutually beneficial goals of respect and understanding.

Teaching and Gaining a Voice: A Rhetorical Intersectionality Approach to Pedagogy of Feminist Organizational Communication

We propose a rhetorical intersectionality pedagogy to teach Buzzanell’s (1994) “Gaining a Voice.” Specifically, we advance Buzzanell’s vision by presenting a way to teach this article in an intersectional manner and open the dialogue to a wider range of students. This approach encompasses four needs: (a) unhiding the curriculum and the underlying structure of our academic settings, (b) asking learners and instructors to heed silence and silence breaking, (c) encouraging learners and instructors to embrace rhetorical listening, and (d) setting aside canon and convention to make way for parrhesia within our communication programs. Our contribution foregrounds pedagogy as a vital aspect of higher education’s impact on contemporary and future feminist organizational communication issues.

Listening to lies and legitimacy online: A proposal for digital rhetorical listening

As people scream past each other in an increasingly polarized public sphere, fake news emerges as problem for reception on the Internet. While scholars have posited rhetorical listening as a strategy to bridge these differences in off-line spaces, it has not been fully explored online. Online spaces are becoming increasingly salient and important to theorize though, since polarized groups often communicate and miscommunicate on the Internet. Using the fake news that circulated in the wake of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida as a case study, I demonstrate some of the complications for rhetorical listening that arise through algorithms, interfaces, and performances that perpetuate the spread of fake news. As such, I call for more robust digital listening practices and theories that account for complications of the Internet. I conclude that individuals, platforms, and institutions can all actively promote rhetorical digital listening practices. However, we also need to think about other motivations besides ignorance for spreading fake news.