The World as the American Frontier: Racialized Presidential War Rhetoric

Carney, Zoë Hess; Stuckey, Mary E.

doi:10.1080/1041794x.2015.1043139

Cited by 7 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…This rhetoric cohered into a topoi -an archive of the sayable from which common ground can be established between interlocutor and audience -for antiwar arguments (Ivie, 1980). The argumentative or rhetorical bases from which specific representations derive (Cisneros, 2008), the topos of war rhetoric focuses on depicting the enemy as savage and the U.S. as beneficent (Carney & Stuckey, 2015). Scholars have cataloged the topoi presidents have "employed to justify American military action," including that of the "reluctant warrior" (Smith & Dionisopoulos, 2008, p. 522), the continuity of the "topoi of force versus freedom" across U.S. history (Fowler, 2017, p. 45), and the "contrastive features" between us and them (Edwards et al, 2011, p. 342).…”

Section: Early Topoi For Resisting Warmentioning

confidence: 99%

Establishing the Imperial Presidency: The War of 1812, John Lowell, and the Specter of Perpetual War

Heidt¹

2022

Western Journal of Communication

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Contemporary attention to presidential war power focuses on the possibility of "perpetual war." This essay contextualizes that controversy by returning to the nation's first international crisis -the War of 1812 -to consider the ways James Madison's rhetoric established precedents that empowered presidents to act with rhetorical impunity in international affairs. Analyzing an overlooked but influential anti-war pamphlet written by John Lowell reveals public concerns about Madison's War and the dangers presidential rhetoric poses to the constitutional order. In doing so, this essay revises contemporary thinking about the imperial presidency, the rhetorical presidency, and the nature of perpetual war.

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Section: Early Topoi For Resisting Warmentioning

confidence: 99%

Establishing the Imperial Presidency: The War of 1812, John Lowell, and the Specter of Perpetual War

Heidt¹

2022

Western Journal of Communication

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“…Like the Indians in the Frontier myth, undocumented immigrants are both inside and outside of U.S. territory, and their enemy image is built on conflation and exaggeration (Carney & Stuckey 2015). Just like all natives were treated as enemies during the Indian Wars, "illegal immigrants" are treated as a single undifferentiated mass, despite their various origins, situations, and motivations, and they are conflated with crime, drugs and violence.…”

Section: A Close(r) Enemymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…He has constantly associated them with the MS-13 gang through horrific descriptions of acts committed by the gang, which he refers to as "animals […] preying on children" (2017-12-08). 5 Just as with Indians in the Frontier myth, illegal immigrants may be "primitive savages" but they constitute a national threat nonetheless through deception and trickery (Carney & Stuckey 2015). Trump thus warns the American people that immigrant children have "exploited the loopholes in our laws to enter the country as unaccompanied alien minors.…”

Section: A Close(r) Enemymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Evil Savage Other as Enemy in Modern U.S. Presidential Discourse

Viala-Gaudefroy¹

2020

angles

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Republican and Democratic presidents alike have all affirmed the presence of evil because what matters is not the specific form evil takes but the fact that it exists. In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance remarks, for instance, Barack Obama reminded his audience that "evil does exist" (2009-12-10). American presidents not only publicly assume that evil exists as a powerful force in the world, but also that evil is the same enemy that the U.S. has been fighting all along in all its wars, only with different faces. "At its core," said George W. Bush, "it is an ancient battle between good and evil" (2008-05-15). Similarly, talking at NATO headquarters in 2017, Donald Trump portrayed the Cold War and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks as events "in the eternal battle between good and evil" (2017-05-25). 10 To define a threatening Other as evil is also a way to designate the Self as good. In the case of America, this Self is believed to be virtuous and blessed by God for doing God's work. Evil actions reveal the character of the national community: "And as a result of this evil," concluded George W. Bush, "we're assessing ourselves" (2002-03-08). "Out of this evil," he said elsewhere, "this Nation has shown the world what a compassionate, kind place we are" (2002-03-01). Of all presidents since Franklin D. Roosevelt, George W. Bush has used the word "evil" the most often by far.

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“A New and Coherent Strategy?” Presidential attention and rhetoric in the era of Indian self-determination

Flaherty

2021

J. Race Ethnicity Politics

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This paper explores the dynamics of presidential attention and rhetoric on Native issues and peoples during the self-determination era. Using data from all public statements and papers of the presidents from 1969 to 2016, the work analyzes the level of attention and rhetorical frames of each president from Nixon to Obama, with additional comments on Trump. The analysis reveals that most presidents have given relatively little attention to Native issues compared to their overall volume of public statements, with Democratic Presidents Clinton and Obama offering the most attention. In addition, presidents have used very different rhetorical frames to address Native issues and peoples in their public statements. Presidential rhetoric has been characterized by fluctuating attention and frames, and presidents have not consistently supported Nixon's “new and coherent strategy” throughout the self-determination era.

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The World as the American Frontier: Racialized Presidential War Rhetoric

Cited by 7 publications

References 4 publications

Establishing the Imperial Presidency: The War of 1812, John Lowell, and the Specter of Perpetual War

Establishing the Imperial Presidency: The War of 1812, John Lowell, and the Specter of Perpetual War

The Evil Savage Other as Enemy in Modern U.S. Presidential Discourse

“A New and Coherent Strategy?” Presidential attention and rhetoric in the era of Indian self-determination

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