E10: re:cap (part 1)
It’s a new academic year, and the beginning of a new season of re:verb! In our 2-part season premiere, we take a retrospective look at topics in political and cultural rhetoric that we’ve covered over the past year, taking note of the critical concepts and questions still pertinent to our thinking. It’s a re:verb “re:cap,” for long-time fans as well as newcomers to the show who want to get a taste of our perspective on language-in-action.
In part 1 of our retrospective, Calvin and Alex discuss interviews and analyses from episodes 1-5, bringing in contemporary examples to illustrate how the issues and ideas discussed in those shows remain relevant today. We analyze metaphors and assumptions in the Trump administration’s national security strategy, discuss the embodied, material nature of trauma and memory in Vietnam, and reflect on the battle over facticity and dialogicality vis-à-vis Hurricane Maria’s death toll.
Tune in for part 2 - where we’ll be discussing episodes 6 through 9 – coming soon!
Previous episodes discussed:
Episode 1: Why listen to a podcast about rhetoric and the humanities (w/ Doug Cloud)
Episode 3: How can we make room for a different kind of security discourse?
Episode 4: What is the relationship between trauma and memory? (w/ Taylor Rugg)
Episode 5: How is science represented on Wikipedia, and why does it matter? (w/ Ana Cooke)
Works & Concepts Referenced in this Episode:
Bakhtin, M.M. (1981). The dialogic imagination: Four essays (M. Holquist, Trans.). Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. [on the concept of “dialogicality”]
Chilton, P. A. (1996). Security metaphors: Cold war discourse from containment to common house (Vol. 2). Peter Lang Pub Incorporated.
Chilton, P. A. (1996). The meaning of security. In R. Hariman (Ed), Post-realism: The rhetorical turn in international relations, 193-216. East, Lansing, MI: MSU Press.
Coto, D. (2017, November 8). Puerto Rico reports increase in overall deaths after storm. Associated Press. Retrieved from: https://apnews.com/a64526dd9e314f3aa9de8de6ebd4117a
Dunmire, P. L. (2015). Beyond space and time: Temporal and geographical configurations in US national security discourse. Critical Discourse Studies, 12(3), 297-312.
Milken Institute of Public Health (The George Washington University). (2018). Project report: Ascertainment of the estimated excess mortality from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. Retrieved from: https://prstudy.publichealth.gwu.edu/sites/prstudy.publichealth.gwu.edu/files/reports/Acertainment%20of%20the%20Estimated%20Excess%20Mortality%20from%20Hurricane%20Maria%20in%20Puerto%20Rico.pdf
Robles, F. (2018, August 9). Puerto Rican government acknowledges hurricane death toll of 1,427. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/09/us/puerto-rico-death-toll-maria.html
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Website for the Vietnam War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City, VN: http://warremnantsmuseum.com/
Alex’s tweet thread on visiting the Vietnam War Remnants Museum: https://twitter.com/ajhelberg/status/1030054961957072897
The Trump administration’s National Security Strategy document (Dec. 2017): https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/NSS-Final-12-18-2017-0905.pdf