The Routledge Reader of African American Rhetoric: The Longue Duree of Black Voices

The Routledge Reader of African American Rhetoric is a comprehensive compendium of primary texts that is designed for use by students, teachers, and scholars of rhetoric and for the general public interested in the history of African American communication. The volume and its companion website include dialogues, creative works, essays, folklore, music, interviews, news stories, raps, videos, and speeches that are performed or written by African Americans. Both the book as a whole and the various selections in it speak directly to the artistic, cultural, economic, gendered, social, and political condition of African Americans from the enslavement period in America to the present, as well as to the Black Diaspora.

Table of Contents:
Part I: African American Rhetoric—Definitions and Understanding Introduction: African American Rhetoric: What It Be, What It Do Volume Editors: Vershawn Ashanti Young and Michelle Bachelor Robinson Section 1. African American Rhetorical theory Edited by Vershawn Ashanti Young and Michelle Bachelor Robinson Part II: The Blackest Hours—Origins and Histories of African American Rhetoric Introduction: "Coming Out of the Dark": The Beginnings of African American Rhetoric Edited and with an Introduction by Michelle Bachelor Robinson Section 2. Nobody Knows Our Name: African Orature in the American Diaspora Edited and with an Introduction by Kermit E. Campbell Section 3. Religion and Spirituality/Transportations and Transformations of Spirituality and Identity in the New World Edited and with an Introduction by Kameelah Martin and Elizabeth West Section 4. Language, Literacy, and Education Edited and with an Introduction by Valerie Kinloch and Donja Thomas Section 5. Black Presence: African American Political Rhetoric Edited and with an Introduction by Michelle Bachelor Robinson Part III: Discourses On Black Bodies Introduction: Genders and Sexualities Vershawn Ashanti Young Section 6. Race Women and Black Feminisms Edited and with an Introduction by Joy James Section 7. Motions of Manhood Edited and with an Introduction by Vershawn Ashanti Young Section 8. the Quare of Queer Edited and with an Introduction by Jeffrey McCune Part IV: The New Blackness: Multiple Cultures, Multiple Modes Introductions: Courageous Rhetoric: Caribbean Foundations, New Media, and Black Aesthetics Vershawn Ashanti Young Everyday Rhetoric: Rhetoric Everyday Michelle Bachelor Robinson Section 9. Caribbean Thought and Its Critique of Subjugation Edited and with an Introduction by Aaron Kamugisha and Yanique Hume Section 10. Black Technocultural Expressivity Edited and with an Introduction by Dara N. Byrne Section 11. Beat Rebels Corrupting Youth Against Babylon Edited and with an Introduction by Greg Thomas Section 12. Black Arts: Black Argument Edited and with an Introduction by Michelle Bachelor Robinson

About the Author :
Vershawn Ashanti Young works in the following areas of Africana studies: language, gender, performance studies, and rhetoric. He is on faculty in the Department of Drama and Speech Communication at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He has published in such journals as PMLA, African American Review, College Communication and Composition, JAC: A Journal of Rhetoric, Politics, and Society, and Present Tense: A Journal of Rhetoric in Society. Michelle Bachelor Robinson is the director of the Comprehensive Writing Program and a professor of African American Rhetoric at Spelman College. Her research and teaching focus on community engagement, historiography, African American rhetoric and literacy, composition pedagogy and theory, and student and program assessment. She is actively involved in community research, oral history collection, and community writing and serves as a university partner and consultant for the Historic Black Towns and Settlements Alliance, Inc.