|
Showing 1 - 2 of
2 matches in All Departments
This volume explores a central political paradox: why American
scholars, journalists, and citizens periodically question the
viability of their presidential electoral system and yet believe
that presidential elections are our best hope for tomorrow. The
book argues that the key to understanding this paradox lies in the
concept of "self-image," exploring relationships between campaign
activities and political culture. After presenting an introduction
to the history of presidential campaigning and a theory of
political image, the book arranges essays in three parts: images
centered on candidates, mass media, and the public. A final essay
assesses explanations of the contrasts between the 1988 and
1992elections and suggests tomorrow's research agenda.
This book examines political rhetoric at the grassroots level.
Starting from a position that ""Democracy depends on details, or
else remains a formal abstraction,"" editors Karen Tracy, James P.
McDaniel, and Bruce Gronbeck argue that a true understanding of the
democratic body politic becomes most intelligible through a close
study of its parts. An academic preference for grandiose, abstract
political theory, the editors contend, undervalues and masks the
patterns of social interaction, strategic discourse, and vernacular
rhetorical resources - a public language, in short - to be found at
the grassroots level and at the core of ""ordinary democracy.""
Each essay focuses on the same local controversy. In 2001, in a
predominantly white Colorado community, a third-grade girl
submitted an experiment to the school science fair. She asked 30
adults and 30 fifth-graders which of two Barbie dolls was prettier.
One doll was black, the other white, and each wore a different
colored dress. All of the adults picked the Barbie in the purple
dress, while nearly all of the fifth graders picked the white
Barbie. When the student's experiment was banned by school
administrators from the science fair for violating the district's
nondiscrimination policy, an uproar resulted that spread from a
local cable channel to a metropolitan newspaper, the Associated
Press, and the national media. A series of school board meetings
and other public exchanges highlighted the potent intersection of
local and national social concerns: education, censorship, science,
racism, and tensions between foundation values such as liberty,
democracy, and free speech. For the authors of these essays, who
focus principally on speech (verbal exchanges as symbolic action),
the events surrounding ""Barbiegate"" illustrate how individual
acts and communal interpretations of customs, policies, and
ideologies are connected and are fundamental to our understanding
of civic judgment in a democratic state. In addition to the
introduction and essays, appendixes supply transcripts of fourteen
key speeches by citizens and school board members involved in the
debates, as well as a URL where speeches may be viewed.
|
You may like...
Loot
Nadine Gordimer
Paperback
(2)
R398
R330
Discovery Miles 3 300
Morbius
Jared Leto, Matt Smith, …
DVD
R179
Discovery Miles 1 790
Loot
Nadine Gordimer
Paperback
(2)
R398
R330
Discovery Miles 3 300
Loot
Nadine Gordimer
Paperback
(2)
R398
R330
Discovery Miles 3 300
|