The theatricality of Lion Rock: Toward a new materialist theory for events of dissention Gruber, David R Published in: Quarterly Journal of Speech DOI: 10.1080/00335630.2020.1828607 Publication date: 2020 Document version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Document license: CC BY Citation for published version (APA): Gruber, D. R. (2020). The theatricality of Lion Rock: Toward a new materialist theory for events of dissention. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 106(4), 453-469. https://doi.org/10.1080/00335630.2020.1828607 Download date: 25. sep.. 2021 Quarterly Journal of Speech ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rqjs20 The theatricality of Lion Rock: A new materialist theory for events of dissention David R. Gruber To cite this article: David R. Gruber (2020) The theatricality of Lion Rock: A new materialist theory for events of dissention, Quarterly Journal of Speech, 106:4, 453-469, DOI: 10.1080/00335630.2020.1828607 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00335630.2020.1828607 Published online: 02 Nov 2020. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 175 View related articles View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rqjs20 QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH 2020, VOL. 106, NO. 4, 453–469 https://doi.org/10.1080/00335630.2020.1828607 The theatricality of Lion Rock: A new materialist theory for events of dissention David R. Gruber Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY Rhetorical scholarship typically conceptualizes an event of Received 8 May 2019 dissention as a break in a dominant discourse. More recent Accepted 5 September 2020 scholarship drawing upon rhetorical ecologies and new KEYWORDS materialisms suggests, however, that analyses of events of fi Bodies; dissent; Hong Kong; dissention would bene t from greater consideration of bodies materiality; protest and environments. Things can also initiate “fissures of unreason” through their material presences and encounters with their physical dynamics, un/healthful effects, or felt forces. An analysis of the 2014 Lion Rock pro-democracy protest in Hong Kong encourages detailed thinking about how material capacities enable protest rhetorics. Ultimately, I argue that the event at Lion Rock is best characterized as a theatrical event of dissention, which demonstrates the integral role of the material in bringing about “unruly rhetorics.” Hong Kong has been a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China since the British handover in 1997 after over one hundred years of colonial administration.1 As a result of British governance and influence, Hong Kong has existed with a largely independent political structure having its own system of laws.2 However, in September of 2014, the Hong Kong government proposed reforms to the process of electing the Chief Executive of the region, which made clear that in the event of open democratic elections, Beijing would be able to reject any chosen Executive deemed unfavorable to the Communist Party of China (CPC). Although the Chief Executive position was and continues to be chosen by a select group of influential business people and lawmakers, having free elec- tions has been a long-term goal for many dedicated to democracy in Hong Kong.3 The new legislation would have stripped any electoral process of its meaningfulness, as a CPC-leaning official would be the only viable choice. On September 26, 2014, this devel- opment sparked an inter-university student advocacy group called The Hong Kong Fed- eration of Students to join with a pro-democracy student group called Scholarism to stage a large protest outside of the Central Government Complex. The movement quickly picked up steam and media attention, ballooning to thousands within twenty-four hours.4 Two days later, the Occupy Central with Love and Peace movement was declared, and up to 100,000 people shut down several blocks in the city’s business district for three months, until December 11.5 Students and other likeminded advocates demanded free CONTACT David R. Gruber [email protected] © 2020 National Communication Association 454 D. R. GRUBER elections and the continuation of Hong Kong’s unique and protected status. In some of the earliest efforts to dislodge the protestors, the police deployed tear gas against the stu- dents, eliciting sympathy for the students from both the local population and global audi- ences.6 Because students used umbrellas as protection, the movement soon became known as the “Umbrella Movement.”7 News images of students defiantly raising yellow umbrellas while tear gas canisters fell around them served as a visual declaration of the vivacious spirit of those Hongkongers desiring more transparent and free demo- cratic processes even as Beijing sought greater control.8 A month into the protest movement, however, progress had stalled. The Chief Executive, Leung Chun-ying, stated that the new Beijing-oriented election system would go forward, regardless of any further student action. Leung, known locally as CY, was largely viewed as a Beijing stooge and nicknamed the “wolf” of Hong Kong for his failure to express care for the region’spoorandhisefforts to undermine pro- democracy parties.9 In a news interview on October 20, Leung floated a new line of argumentation, saying that “DemocracywouldseepoorpeopledominatetheHong Kong vote.”10 This statement, alongside threats to arrest student protest leaders, further entrenched the government and pro-democracy advocates and prompted a pre- viously unknown group of fourteen rock climbers to create a massive 6×28 meter yellow banner reading “I Want Real Universal Suffrage” in traditional Chinese charac- ters.11 The group—calling themselves “Hong Kong Spidie”12 after the superhero Spi- derman—scaled the face of Lion Rock, a 495-meter granite mountain towering over Hong Kong. The climbers hung the banner and video recorded the event. One climber, dressed in full Spiderman costume, crouched on top of Lion Rock like the iconic superhero. He addressed the camera, stating that Hong Kong Spidie hung the banner because the chief executive [CY] only cares about the rich people living on Victoria Peak … We think the spirit of Lion Rock isn’t just about money. The people fighting for real universal suffrage all over Hong Kong have shown great perseverance. This kind of fighting against injustice, strength in the face of troubles, is the true Lion Rock spirit.13 Images of the pro-democracy banner draped down the face of Lion Rock “exploded on social media.”14 News stories in the days that followed highlighted the daring aspects of the act, not only in terms of the unmissable textual declaration above the city but also the physical feat of climbing up there and hanging it. South China Morning Post, the premier newspaper of the region, reported that “the climbers’ nerve” prompted numerous social posts.15 Likewise, Coconuts Hong Kong, a cheeky news media site targeting a millennial audience, captured the sentiment when it reported, “Whoa! Some crazy mountain clim- bers have managed to unfurl a massive banner saying ‘I want real universal suffrage’ from Hong Kong’s iconic Lion Rock Mountain!”16 A second article the next day featured “the epic behind-the-scenes video, which features the rock climbers rappelling down the rock face.”17 A series of memes after the initial event circulated widely and included images of the banner being taken to the moon by astronauts, being worn by the lion standing at the edge of the rock from the film The Lion King, and being waved gloriously and proudly over the night lights of Hong Kong.18 In the following days, small copies of the banner were made into ribbons and distributed to protestors who plastered them across the city and wore them on their shirts.19 The recognizable image of the yellow banner, which remained on Lion Rock for just over twenty-four hours before being QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH 455 removed by government officials, crystallized the determination of the protestors and the message of the Umbrella Movement. In analyzing the specific case of Lion Rock, I demonstrate how the immense bodily efforts performed using the material qualities of the rock itself, so set in the cityscape, turns this act of protest into a theatrical event of dissention—a timely and stunningly physical performance working with and through salient materialities. A theatrical event of dissention emphasizes kairos as an emergent quality of bodily engagement and material environment.20 In this instance, members of the “Hong Kong Spidie” group kairotically commingled their bodily performances with Lion Rock’s material capacities to shift the political discourse and deepen feelings about democracy amongst protestors in Hong Kong at that time. Lion Rock, as a theatrical event of dissen- tion, serves as a paradigmatic case of doing with that exposes not only how things, like rocks, can inspire protestors to resist political arrangements but also how they provide the means through which “unruly rhetorics” emerge.21 Lion Rock encourages more detailed thinking about how material capacities enable performances of political dissent that break or fissure dominant discourses. In what follows, I review the rhetorical literature on events of dissention, noting the emphasis on discursive dimensions in order to forward a revised concept that I call the theatrical event of dissention. This concept foregrounds how and to what extent material presences and human-nonhuman relations open spaces of dissention. Theatrical events of dissention become possible when material environments appear as “fissures” such that bodies discover something new and scandalous to do in relation to a thing, not necessarily a discourse. Living with materiality—touching, breathing, using, disco- vering what things can do—commences new possibilities for dissent. Consequently, thea- trical events of dissention may prove instructive to both rhetorical theory and governance.