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University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Great Plains Quarterly Great Plains Studies, Center for Summer 2002 "Private" Lives And "Public" Writing Rhetorical Practices Of Western Nebraska Women Charlotte Hogg Texas Christian University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/greatplainsquarterly Part of the Other International and Area Studies Commons Hogg, Charlotte, ""Private" Lives And "Public" Writing Rhetorical Practices Of Western Nebraska Women" (2002). Great Plains Quarterly. 2322. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/greatplainsquarterly/2322 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Great Plains Studies, Center for at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Great Plains Quarterly by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. "PRIVATE" LIVES AND "PUBLIC" WRITING RHETORICAL PRACTICES OF WESTERN NEBRASKA WOMEN CHARLOTTE HOGG The library in the western Nebraska town of for years, but here were her words in a newspa­ Paxton (population approximately 500) is per, which to me was identified as a place for small, and my grandmother was president of public consumption. This was one of the first the library board for many years. When I was examples I recall of the boundaries of public younger, I learned about the history of the and private writing converging. My own library from her research and writing published grandma was only one example. In the com­ in the local county newspaper. In write-ups munity in which I lived, older women con­ for both the library's twenty-fifth and fiftieth tributed memoirs to the town library, wrote anniversaries, she described how women "were for the newspaper, and wrote histories of the found to be very handy with hammer and saw" town, churches, and school. These women not when starting the library.! I saw my grandma only shaped my writing life but were respon­ frequently and had been hearing her stories sible for the rhetorical education of others in the community through these literacy prac­ tices. In my explication of the kinds of lit­ eracy practices of women in Paxton, I show that in this particular setting, their rhetorical p'ractices do not fit our definitions of the pri­ KEY WORDS: literacy, Paxton, public and private vate sphere so often used to situate women's spheres, rhetoric, rural women reading and writing lives, though that sphere does offer an important space where rhetori­ Charlotte Hogg is assistant professor of English at Texas cal education is undertaken.2 Christian University. This piece is part of a larger Scholars in the field of composition and project on the literacy practices of older women in rhetoric have long investigated the role of western Nebraska. Other work from this project has appeared in Western American Literature. public vs. private lives; the study of rhetorical figures from antiquity involved the Greek polis, and the legacy of the "separate spheres" is [GPQ 22 (Summer 2002): 183-98] traced from that historical period. However, 183 184 GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY, SUMMER 2002 FIG. 1. Downtown Paxton Nebraska, May 2002. Photo courtesy of Todd Kerstetter. as Kate Ronald points out, it is scholars' read­ literature: O. E. Rolvaag's Beret, Willa Cather's ing of history that created these binaries: Antonia, and Laura Ingalls Wilder. Of course, "[Cllassical rhetoric did indeed value personal adding to our understanding of what has be­ discourse, but finally .... the distinction be­ come the defining period in Plains history and tween personal and public discourse is one culture is critical; similarly, exploring the ways that would not have made sense to classical contemporary Plains women respond to and rhetoricians, nor is it useful to us today."3 She exist within the context of that history is nec­ explains that persuasion of the self was often essary. Studying the ways in which women's an integral part of persuading an audience; writing practices have been at work in the thus the personal and public were intertwined. Plains at any time in its history is one way to For women in Paxton, their merging of pub­ understand how the culture is shaped for and lic and private both creates and reflects Great by them. Plains culture-much of the reading and writ­ In this article, I show how women in Paxton, ing they did focused on the western Nebraska shaped by their rural Plains lifestyle, challenge region and can, I believe, tell us much about limited conceptions of "public" and "private" life for women on the Plains. Cary W. de Wit literacies in written rhetorical moves that pro­ notes in a study on women's sense of place vide them a kind of power in their patriarchal that few studies of contemporary Plains women communities. Their writings illuminate the of any ethnic background currently exist.4 ways in which the public and private spheres Over the past quarter century, while scholar­ can overlap and merge in real, literate lives ship on Great Plains women has greatly in­ that are messier than academic constructs creased, much of the work has focused on the sometimes make them out to be. After a brief experiences of 19th century white women and discussion of my ethnographic methodology, I their settlement and travel across the over­ provide an overview of the way the separate land trails.s Images from this time are rein­ spheres are described and sustained by many forced in the enduring prairie women from theorists and explain how the privileging of PRIVATE LIVES AND PUBLIC WRITING 185 t!.. , SOUTH DAKOTA N E B R A KANSAS FIG. 2. Map of Nebraska showing Paxton in relation to the Platte River. Map by Tracy Ellen Smith, Mapsmith, etc. the "public" leaves the two spheres not only conducted an ethnographic study of three separate but hierarchical. I then show how African American churches, including one she the rigid construct of dichotomous spheres had attended, explains that "while ethnogra­ doesn't apply in Paxton within local rhetori­ phy in general is concerned with describing cal contexts such as the newspaper and the and analyzing a culture, ethnography in com­ collection of memoirs housed at the village position studies is generally topic oriented and library. In their writings that meld public and concerned more narrowly with communica­ private, these women created a rhetorical space tive behavior or the interrelationship of lan­ that allowed them to negotiate their identi­ guage and culture."7 These nuances are of ties in an agrarian culture. particular relevance regarding women's rhe­ torical practices where much of their literacy METHODOLOGY AND ETHNOGRAPHIC work has been relegated as "extracurricular" CHOICES (i.e., social) because it is not produced in the "public" sphere. The kinds of literacy work In 1981 anthropologist John F. Szwed made the Paxton women engaged in would not ap­ the claim that "ethnographic methods ... are pear in the traditional data that quantifies the only means for finding out what literacy educational experience and other "measur­ really is and what can validly be measured."6 able" aspects of literacy knowledge. Part of To him, other methods of data collection and what brought me to this research in the first inquiry that are more broad and comprehen­ place was my resistance to the idea that there sive must rely on generalizations in ways that was nothing about Paxton women to study often do not account for the social and cul­ because they were "only" housewives. From tural nuances of people's lives. For composi­ living in the town, I knew these women led tion theorists, this kind of inquiry is the complex lives and that the locus of their work foundation of our ethnographic practices. and lives was through social and cultural en­ Beverly J. Moss, a composition scholar who gagement that shaped their writings. I also 186 GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY, SUMMER 2002 FIG. 2: Paxton Public Library , March 1999. Photo courtesy of author. knew that the best way to access the social so central to ethnographies and also from my and cultural facets of their lives was through own lived experience from when I resided in specific and local study-talking with them Paxton, Nebraska. By thinking of this study as about their literate lives and participating in ethnographic and essayistic-and by that word town activities as I did throughout my teens. I mean writing as searching for more compli­ In A Thrice-Told Tale, anthropologist and cated understanding-I am better able to fore­ ethnographer Margery Wolf calls into ques- ground my own biases and unique perspectives , tion assumptions made by many postmodern as a researcher and former member of the com­ theorists of ethnography and takes up the is­ munity. Those biases and perspectives playa sue of form. Her book raises issues about how key role in how I conducted my interviews reflexivity "has made a good many of us take and made my observations. In addition, my stock of who is now in our audience."8 As a purpose in constructing the text in such a feminist, Wolf claims that "if our writings are manner is meant not only to challenge the not easily accessible to those who share our often-unquestioned masculinist argumentative goals, we have failed. "9 The research I describe academic conventions but also to more closely below is best considered essayist-ethnographic embody the kinds of writing valued by the in that it employs many of the methodologies women in my study. of ethnography-thick description from im­ mersion, participant observation, and inquiry THE DATA into a specific site in order to help readers understand the rhetorical practices of a cul­ At the inception of my ethnographic ture.

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