Logan, Shirley Wilson. Liberating Language: Sites of Rhetorical Education in Nineteenth-Century Black America. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2008.
INTRODUCTION: “‘By the Way, Where Did You Learn to Speak?’”
An overview of her study, scope, method, and purpose as explained in her “Introduction”:
- WHAT and WHEN: Logan seeks to answer the question, “Where did [African Americans in the late 18th-early 19th century] learn to speak?” Specifically, she’s interested in identifying and analyzing sites of rhetorical education—those places where AAs were instructed explicitly or implicitly in being rhetorical in their communicative experiences.
2. WHERE and HOW: Her sites of research and textual artifacts analyzed within her book are:
a. CH1: “white-sponsored slave missions and initiatives emerging from within communities of the enslaved,” “the black Union regiments during the Civil War,” “the activities of the Republican Loyal League” (6-7)
b. CH2: diaries from multiple individuals; published advice manuals (7)
c. CH3: literacy societies “primarily in Philadelphia and New York, both single sex and mixed, church-affiliated, school-affiliated, and community-based” (7)
d. CH4: Black periodicals (8)
e. Throughout each of her chapters: calls on famous Black rhetors to make “cautious generalizations” (9)
3. WHY: She seeks answers to her research question because she hopes it will “broaden our approaches to contemporary rhetorical education and thereby help to further participation in democracy” (3). She also hopes to inform: “This study will expand our understanding of the various ways in which African Americans, faced with the consequences of enslavement and oppressive color prejudice, acquired rhetorical competence during the late eighteenth century and across the nineteenth century” (9).
Her strategies for supporting her methodology:
· Shows exigency in her study by providing a few examples of the challenges AAs faced in engaging in literacy practices and illustrating how so many white folks were shocked (this being “a form of ‘soft bigotry,’” quoting Anna Perez, 3).
· Defines her terms (e.g. rhetorical education, basic literacy) by calling on main rhetoric folks (Burke, Bitzer, Aristotle).
· Situates her methods of analyzing literacy practices of a population in the margins by likening her study to other main literacy folks (Royster, Williams, Jarratt, Zaluda, Gold).
· Situates her focus on AAs by citing others with a similar target population (Kates, Schneider, Anderson, Franklin, Porter, McHenry).
CHAPTER 1: “Free-Floating Literacy: Early African American Rhetorical Traditions”
Her method:
· She investigates rhetorical traditions and literacy practices in multiple sites to make claims about the experiences of AAs in the 18th-19th centuries. Sites and summaries include:
o “Plantation Literacies”: Records of “invisible institutions” (like group meetings in the woods where members could develop expression and worship) and slave missions where AAs received literacy education. These practices often helped to engrain the oral traditions of the culture.
o “Pulpit Literacies”: Missions helped AAs develop memorization skills. Rhetoric textbooks like The Columbian Orator helped AAs like Frederick Douglas realize the power of rhetoric in enacting freedom.
o “Battlefield Literacies”: Since AAs were coming together in the military and sharing literacy skills and since some military officials would initiate literacy education and/or develop schools for these soldiers, much of their rhetorical traditions were garnered through these experiences. Specifically, AA individuals participated in literacy practices by reading, discussing, and producing letters, newspapers, and speeches/poetry readings.
o “Political Literacies”: Sponsored by Union or Loyal League Movement, AAs also experienced literacy through night schools and other community gatherings aimed at promoting political activity and power.
o “Postbellum Workplace Literacies”: Some AAs may have also experienced literacy through working at cigar factories where they practiced la lectura, a custom where individuals were elected (based on mutual respect for their intelligence) to read texts aloud during cigar rolling and workers would use these texts as bases for debate and public argument.
· The evidence she presents come from various sources:
o Examples of AA’s experiences in the 19th century and many of her terms of analysis from scholars’ previous studies (Costen, Nunley, Raboteau)
o References to historical moments, folks, or events (antebellum South, slave laws, slave mission movements, Militia Act, etc.)
o Analysis of primary texts of published AA writing and of AAs’ personal narratives (Elizabeth Johnson Harris, Frederick Douglas, Charles Colcock Jones, Amanda Berry Smith, Christian Recorder, Weekly Anglo-African)
· She keeps the analysis informational and refrains from making connections between the literacy practices of then to what’s happening today.
Key people and their terms:
· Ralph Ellison’s “free-floating literacy” (11)
· Shirley Brice Heath and Beverly J. Moss’ “literacy events” (11)
· Melva Wilson Costen’s “Invisible Institutions,” (12)
· Vorris L. Nunley’s “hush harbor rhetoric” (12)
My question:
Since in class we’ve been really emphasizing the importance of methods, methodology, and the building of a researcher ethos, it was a bit surprising to me that Logan does not spend time detailing her methods and methodologies. While she references primary sources and other scholarly work, we never seem to learn where and how she collected data. I then remembered how in our colloquium Lois focused less on step-by-step methods for a historical approach in her discussion of her research and Tolar Burton also stayed away from explicit discussion of procedural methods (even stating something about it might be boring for us to hear her methods). Although I imagine this trend for not detailing methods and methodologies is not unique to historiographers, I wonder why some are less inclined to provide such detailed accounts of data gathering and analysis. I wonder if we associate such descriptions as “boring” or too “science-like.” Maybe archival research feels too open-ended and exploratory to be defined methodologically. Maybe we just haven’t valued this practice as much until recently. Maybe historiographers assume we already know methods for historical approaches. Either way, I was interested to observe this trend, and I’m curious as to why researchers might be inclined to leave out discussions of their methods and methodologies and how we might work to address this issue.
