Womanish ways: The rhetoric of Black women politicians

Scholarship in political communication studies has largely focused on the experiences of White men and women, rendering the experiences of people of color as anomalous, nonexistent and/or irrelevant. Scholars seeking to change this tradition have given attention to Black women as political actors, arguing that the obstacles of racism and sexism distinctively shape their political experience. Visual representations of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice illustrate the stereotypical misconceptions Black women politicians often face. This dissertation uses rhetorical analysis to illuminate the bold, wise, responsible, and rebellious strategies that some Black American women enact to advance a unique political tradition based on their experiences of race and gender. This study includes case studies that highlight the political communication of Charlotta Bass, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Moseley-Braun, U.S. Congresswoman Barbara Lee, and South Carolina Representative Gilda Cobb-Hunter. The types of political communication featured in this work include: convention speeches, congressional statements, autobiographies, campaign websites, and silence. Each message analyzed is considered rhetorical---designed with the purpose of affirming one's identity in the political arena and inviting others to participate in important deliberations about American society. This analysis of Black women's political communication is framed by Alice Walker's womanism and, specifically, Black usage of the word "womanish." Attention to womanish rhetorical strategies reveals how Black women impact politics by designing messages that confront and transform analyses which suggest they are fatally, flawed. Womanish women use political communication to transform the negative impact of racism and sexism into positive opportunities for change and political success---for themselves and for the many groups they represent. This dissertation ensures that the practices and experiences of Black political women are preserved and recovered for the future. A womanish perspective enriches traditional narratives of politics and provides new ways to define politics in terms beyond simply "left" and "right" or "conservative" and "liberal." Close study of the rhetorics of Black women politicians encourages reconsideration of the shortcomings of a representative democracy, promotes decentering politics as belonging only to the powerful, and embraces nontraditional political actions that are designed to meet the needs of a nation's peoples.