1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910818764603321

Autore

McCann Bryan J.

Titolo

The mark of criminality : rhetoric, race, and gangsta rap in the war-on-crime era / / Bryan J. McCann

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Tuscaloosa, Alabama : , : The University of Alabama Press, , 2017

©2017

ISBN

0-8173-9117-7

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (209 pages) : illustrations

Collana

Rhetoric, Culture, and Social Critique

Disciplina

306.4/842490973

Soggetti

Gangsta rap (Music) - History and criticism

African Americans - Social conditions - 20th century

Crime in music

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.



2.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910966056803321

Autore

Beasley Vanessa B. <1966->

Titolo

You, the people : American national identity in presidential rhetoric / / Vanessa B. Beasley

Pubbl/distr/stampa

College Station, : Texas A&M University Press, c2004

ISBN

1-60344-487-4

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (215 p.)

Collana

Presidential rhetoric series ; ; no. 10

Disciplina

320.54/0973

Soggetti

Nationalism - United States - History

Rhetoric - Political aspects - United States - History

Group identity - Political aspects - United States - History

Presidents - United States - Language

United States Politics and government

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. [189]-198) and index.

Sommario/riassunto

As we ask anew in these troubled times what it means to be an American, You, the People provides perspective by casting its eye over the answers given by past U.S. presidents in their addresses to the public. Who is an American, and who is not? Could any questions be more timely? And yet, as Vanessa Beasley demonstrates in this eloquent exploration of a century of presidential speeches, the questions are not new. Since the Founders first identified the nation as "we, the people," the faces and accents of U.S. citizens have changed dramatically due to immigration and other constitutive changes. Yet on various occasions U.S. presidents have had to speak as if there was one monolithic American people. Here Beasley traces rhetorical constructions of American national identity in presidents' inaugural addresses and state of the union messages from 1885 through 2000. She argues convincingly that while the demographics of the voting citizenry changed rapidly during this period, presidential definitions of American national identity did not. Chief executives have consistently employed a rhetoric of American nationalism that is simultaneously inclusive and exclusive; Beasley examines both the genius and the limitations of this



language. This book invites readers to pay closer attention to some of the platitudinous and perhaps even predictable ways in which presidents, when speaking ritualistically, have encouraged the American people to think of their common bonds. A book for all those puzzling over the nature of citizenship and whether there are new limits in post-9/11 America, this retrospective of presidential definitions of national identity helps readers understand how political community has been possible in the United States and how it can endure in an increasingly multicultural era. Vanessa B. Beasley is an assistant professor in the Division of Corporate Communication and Public Affairs at Southern Methodist Univeristy, where she teaches and researches political communication. She holds a Ph.D. in Communication Studies from the University of Texas at Austin.