Nannie H. Burroughs' Rhetorical Leadership During the Inter-War Period
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ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: NANNIE H. BURROUGHS' RHETORICAL LEADERSHIP DURING THE INTER-WAR PERIOD Ann Michele Mason, Doctor of Philosophy, 2008 Dissertation directed by: Robert N. Gaines Department of Communication Although frequently praised for her rhetorical abilities and widely recognized as an influential leader in the African-American community, Nannie Helen Burroughs' speeches and writings have been the subject of little scholarly treatment. The quest for freedom and equality in America, Burroughs believed, would be satisfied through individual and collective struggle, and while she never advocated directly the use of physical force, she often evoked martial themes—using terms such as battles, enemies, crusades, weapons, and sacrifice—along with ideas related to movement and progress, to motivate action among African-Americans. These ideas, complemented by her stylistic tendencies, inspired continued action during a time when basic citizenship rights seemed out of reach for many African-Americans. This rhetorical tendency seemed most strategic during the 1920s and 1930s, a time when African-Americans experienced a renewed and seemingly coordinated assault on their identity as American citizens. They found their constitutional right to vote threatened, their social and economic status weakened, and their identity as American citizens undermined. Burroughs would skillfully combine various styles of discourse to match her rhetorical goals and the demands of the audiences she addressed. More specifically, she employed a clear, vivid, energetic style to awaken and enlist African- American audiences, to empower politically, provide vision, and to rehabilitate identity during the period between the two world wars. NANNIE H. BURROUGHS' RHETORICAL LEADERSHIP DURING THE INTER- WAR PERIOD by Ann Michele Mason Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland at College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2008 Advisory Committee: Professor Robert N. Gaines, Chair Professor Jeanne Fahnestock Professor Kathleen E. Kendall Professor James F. Klumpp Professor Shirley W. Logan ©Copyright by Ann Michele Mason 2008 ii Preface Kelly Miller, dean of Howard University, once called Nannie Helen Burroughs “a dynamo of feminine energy;” attempting to write about her sometimes felt like trying to capture the wind in my hands. She seemed to move at an extraordinary pace, touching down with great force in nearly every aspect of African-American life for over six decades; tracking her movement during any given time period was no easy task. Born at the close of Reconstruction in Orange, Virginia, Burroughs (1875-1961) moved as a young child with her mother to Washington, D.C. where she would live most of her life. Her mother, Jennie Poindexter Burroughs, worked as a domestic servant while Burroughs attended the city's public schools. After high school graduation in 1894, Burroughs traveled to Philadelphia where she worked as a book keeper and stenographer for The Christian Banner, a baptist periodical. When Banner editor Lewis Jordan moved to Louisville, Kentucky to head the Foreign Mission Board of the National Baptist Convention, Burroughs followed, expanding her efforts beyond the offices of the Foreign Mission Board to organize local industrial and self-help clubs. In 1900 she was elected corresponding secretary to the newly-formed Woman's Convention of the National Baptist Convention, a post she would hold until 1948; Burroughs continued to lead the organization as president, a position she occupied until her death in 1961. As an outgrowth of her work with the Woman's Convention, Burroughs returned to Washington in 1909 to open the National Training School for Girls and Women where she lived and worked full-time as president until her death in 1961. iii The work required to cultivate two new organizations—the Woman's Convention and the National Training School—would have exhausted the energy of most people, but Burroughs successfully built each institution while applying considerable effort in other directions. She was a founding member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, a board member of the National Urban League, the National Association for Colored Women, the National League of Republican Colored Women, and the National Association for Negro History, among other organizations. Youth, women's, and inter-racial groups sought her advice and guidance, and she freely complied with many requests for assistance. A featured speaker before a staggering range of religious, civil, and political groups around the country, Burroughs delivered hundreds of speeches a year; her written work was published widely in African-American newspapers and periodicals. During the last twenty years of her life, she battled cancer while working, at what seemed to be an accelerated pace, to promote a “crusade for brotherhood, equality, and righteousness” in America. When she died in May 1961, she left behind millions of organized and determined African-American citizens who soldiered on in the quest for justice. iv Table of Contents Chapter One: Nannie Burroughs' Quest for Freedom.........................................................1 Introduction.....................................................................................................................1 The Word as a Weapon: Nannie Burroughs' Rhetorical Leadership............................. 4 Opinion Leader among African-Americans....................................................................9 Action as the Foundation to Citizenship....................................................................... 11 Burroughs' Leadership During the 1920s and 30s........................................................ 17 Rationale for Study ...................................................................................................... 20 Close Textual Analysis................................................................................................. 23 Organization of the Dissertation................................................................................... 26 Chapter Two: Burroughs' Rhetorical Training and Development.................................... 29 Introduction...................................................................................................................29 Rhetorical Education in Washington D.C. Schools...................................................... 30 Brainerd Kellogg’s A Text-book on Rhetoric...............................................................35 Moving to Action: Stylistic Fusion of Perspicuity, Imagery, Energy, and Wit............36 Practice in the Classroom..............................................................................................41 Rhetorical Education in the Community.......................................................................43 Burroughs and the Establishment of the Woman's Convention ...................................53 Chapter Three: Political Empowerment: “What the Negro Wants Politically” ...............63 Introduction...................................................................................................................63 The Constitutional Crisis of 1928................................................................................. 66 Burroughs' 1928 Campaign for Constitutional Rights.................................................71 Party Affiliation Among African-Americans ...............................................................75 Post-election Analysis...................................................................................................78 Nannie Burroughs' “What the Negro Wants Politically”..............................................80 African-American Political Power in Practice ............................................................90 African-American Power Proclaimed...........................................................................91 Keeping the Fires Burning: Post-Election Work Among African-Americans..............94 Chapter Four: Transforming Struggle—Burroughs' 1934 Tuskegee Institute Commencement Speech.....................................................................................................99 Introduction...................................................................................................................99 Economic Distress among African-Americans...........................................................101 Burroughs at Tuskegee Institute..................................................................................105 Tuskegee as Battlefield .............................................................................................. 106 The Quest for the New Day........................................................................................ 112 The March Toward Justice..........................................................................................122 Reception of the Tuskegee Speech ............................................................................ 125 Chapter Five: A Long Train of Abuses—The Duty to Revolt........................................129 Introduction ................................................................................................................129 Lynching Increases .....................................................................................................132 Lynching and African-American Identity...................................................................133