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Dramatic Catharsis: Barack Obama's Rhetoric of Redemption

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Dramatic Catharsis: Barack Obama's Rhetoric of Redemption _________________________________________________________________________Swansea University E-Theses Dramatic Catharsis: Barack Obama’s rhetoric of redemption Marshall, Christopher Guy How to cite: _________________________________________________________________________ Marshall, Christopher Guy (2016) Dramatic Catharsis: Barack Obama’s rhetoric of redemption. Doctoral thesis, Swansea University. http://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa37298 Use policy: _________________________________________________________________________ This item is brought to you by Swansea University. Any person downloading material is agreeing to abide by the terms of the repository licence: copies of full text items may be used or reproduced in any format or medium, without prior permission for personal research or study, educational or non-commercial purposes only. The copyright for any work remains with the original author unless otherwise specified. The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holder. Permission for multiple reproductions should be obtained from the original author. Authors are personally responsible for adhering to copyright and publisher restrictions when uploading content to the repository. Please link to the metadata record in the Swansea University repository, Cronfa (link given in the citation reference above.) http://www.swansea.ac.uk/library/researchsupport/ris-support/ Dramatic Catharsis: Barack Obama’s Rhetoric of Redemption Chris Marshall Submitted to Swansea University in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy SWANSEA UNIVERSITY 2017 I Summary The 2008 election of Barack Obama as America’s first African American president was popularly held to represent a fulfilment of Martin Luther King’s Dream and led to speculation about the implications of an Obama victory for a post racial America. This thesis argues that race was a recurring theme of Obama’s election campaign, and that his rhetoric referred frequently to America’s history of racial inequality. It explores how Obama constructed a racial identity that connected him to the African American struggle for civil rights and which placed him within a national progress narrative, and it argues that an important feature of Obama’s campaign was the articulation of a rhetoric of redemption. Academic debates focussing on Obama’s racial identity and the extent to which he spoke about race have been supported either by textual analysis of his speeches or by applying a historical perspective to the campaign. This thesis incorporates both approaches as it combines discourse analysis of a reference corpus of 172 speeches with intertextual and extralinguistic analyses facilitated through contextual knowledge of African American history and culture. The methodology embraces Ruth Wodak’s Discourse-Historical Approach, consideration of Obama’s appropriation of the Exodus narrative, and the application of Kenneth Burke’s dramatistic pentad to explore the construction and representation of racial identity in Obama’s rhetoric. The approach identifies an analytic corpus of 41 speeches which focus on race. This is used to identify how Obama presented his personal history within the context of the civil rights struggle and how he positioned his campaign to neither confront nor accommodate white America about racism and inequality. The results reveal Obama’s desire for a national catharsis in repudiation of America’s history of racial injustice; a redemptive moment made possible through unity, atonement and the collective effort encapsulated in the campaign slogan, “yes, we can”. II Declarations and statements DECLARATION This work has not previously been accepted in substance for any degree and is not being concurrently submitted in candidature for any degree. Signed ...................................................................... (candidate) Date ........................................................................ STATEMENT 1 This thesis is the result of my own investigations, except where otherwise stated. Where correction services have been used, the extent and nature of the correction is clearly marked in a footnote(s). Other sources are acknowledged by footnotes giving explicit references. A bibliography is appended. Signed ..................................................................... (candidate) Date ........................................................................ STATEMENT 2 I hereby give consent for my thesis, if accepted, to be available for photocopying and for inter-library loan, and for the title and summary to be made available to outside organisations. Signed ..................................................................... (candidate) Date ........................................................................ III Contents Page i Summary ii Declarations and Statements iii Contents iv Acknowledgements v List of tables vi List of figures vii Publications, conference and seminar papers ix “The burdens of our past” 1 Headlines from the front pages of America’s newspapers, 5 November 2008 4 Chapter 1 Introduction 21 Chapter 2 Literature Review 48 Chapter 3 Methodology 68 Chapter 4 Obama and Race 118 Chapter 5 Obama and Civil Rights 166 Chapter 6 Obama and Redemption 223 Chapter 7 Conclusions 240 Epilogue 245 Appendix 1 Corpus of speeches 246 Appendix 2 Table of results: the analytic corpus 254 Appendix 3 Table of results: sub-topics in the topic of race 260 Bibliography IV Acknowledgements This thesis began in the noise and excitement of “Obamamania” and is completed as Obama’s presidency draws to a close. It is the product not just of late nights, occasional frustration and moments of clarity, but also of the advice, guidance, support, and goodwill of a great many people. I owe an immense debt of gratitude to those who have made this thesis possible. To Swansea University for the generous support of a staff bursary, which has enabled me to pursue my interests and to fulfil a long-held ambition. To my supervisors, Dr Rachel Farebrother and Professor Nuria Lorenzo-Dus, whose encouragement, insights, and advice have helped me to take the thesis into unexpected but rewarding places. I am particularly grateful to Rachel for sharing her extensive knowledge of African American culture and history to illuminate and inform my research, and to Nuria for helping me to shape and then fine-tune my research methodology. I could not have asked for more supportive or attentive supervisors, and I have greatly enjoyed working with them. To Professor Noel Thompson (Swansea) for always taking an interest, in my running as much as in my research; Professor Matt Jones (Swansea) for helping me to keep a sense of perspective; Professor Helen Fulton (Bristol) for encouraging me to take the next step, and Dr Elaine Canning and Swansea’s Research Institute for Arts and Humanities for the opportunities to practise and debate. To my friends, Jonathan Burnes, Rhian Morris, Andrea Buck, and Patricia Lawson-Davies, for the years of support and for never taking things too seriously. To my sister, Julie, for being a constant inspiration. Lastly but above all, to my family, without whose love and support I would not have stayed the course. To my wife, Jo, for always being patient, for understanding, and for making a world of difference in so many ways. And to our wonderful children, Sam and Sally, for the laughter, the joy, and the welcome distractions. This thesis is dedicated to the memory of my mother, Wendy Marshall, who knew I’d started and presumed I’d finish. CM, 2016 V List of tables Page 39 Table 1 States with less than 30% of white Americans voting for Obama 40 Table 2 Candidate preferences by race, 2004-2008 57 Table 3 Fields of action and genres 58 Table 4 Extract from Appendix 2 (speech selection process) 61 Table 5 Sub-topics in the topic of race VI List of figures Page 91 Figure 1 Senator Barack Obama takes time out of his campaign in North Carolina to play basketball. 92 Figure 2 Michelle and Barack Obama fist bump at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. 93 Figure 3 Cover of the New Yorker, 14 July 2008, depicting the Obamas as radical, flag-burning, militant Muslims, in the White House. 158 Figure 4 Barack and Michelle Obama on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the “We are one” inauguration celebration concert. 159 Figure 5 Obama, Hillary and Bill Clinton lead the march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge to commemorate the Selma Voting Rights Marches. 161 Figure 6 Barack Obama gives his A More Perfect Union speech at the National Constitution Center, Philadelphia. 200 Figure 7 Obama’s campaign logo. 202 Figure 8 US presidential campaign logos, 1988-2008. 204 Figure 9 Obama in Metropolis. 205 Figure 10 HOPE by Shephard Fairey. 207 Figure 11 Time Magazine cover, 10 December 2007. 208 Figure 12 Representative selection of pictures from media coverage generated during the 2008 campaign, featuring Obama with a halo. 209 Figure 13 Rolling Stone magazine cover, March 2008. 209 Figure 14 Der Spiegel magazine cover, July 2008. 210 Figure 15 The New Republic magazine cover, January 2008. VII Publications Marshall, Christopher G (2012), From Gettysburg to Grant Park: Echoes of Lincoln in the Campaign Rhetoric of Barack Obama, Comparative American Studies, 10 (2-3), August 2012, pp. 154-162 Conference and seminar papers 1 From Gettysburg to Grant Park: Echoes of Lincoln in the Campaign Rhetoric of Barack Obama. (“Texting Obama” conference, Manchester Metropolitan University, 7-10 September
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