TY - JOUR
T1 - Rhetorical Citizenship
T2 - Studying the Discursive Crafting and Enactment of Citizenship
AU - Kock, Christian Erik J
AU - Villadsen, Lisa Storm
PY - 2017/7/4
Y1 - 2017/7/4
N2 - This article argues for the relevance of a rhetorical approach to the study of citizenship, proposing the concept of rhetorical citizenship as a term for a fourth dimension of citizenship and as a scholarly approach to the topic in addition to the dimensions of status, rights, and identity commonly recognized in the literature. We show how this view aligns with current views of the multidi Citizenship Studies mensionality of citizenship, explain our use of the term rhetoric, and illustrate the usefulness of a rhetorical approach in two examples. In close textual readings both examples–one vernacular, one elite–are shown to discursively craft and enact different notions of citizenship vis-a-vis the European refugee crisis. We conclude that a rhetorical perspective on public civic discourse is useful in virtue of its close attention to discursive creativity as well as to textual properties that may significantly, but often implicitly, affect citizens’ understanding of their own role in the polity, and further because it recognizes deep differences as inevitable while valorizing discourse across them.
AB - This article argues for the relevance of a rhetorical approach to the study of citizenship, proposing the concept of rhetorical citizenship as a term for a fourth dimension of citizenship and as a scholarly approach to the topic in addition to the dimensions of status, rights, and identity commonly recognized in the literature. We show how this view aligns with current views of the multidi Citizenship Studies mensionality of citizenship, explain our use of the term rhetoric, and illustrate the usefulness of a rhetorical approach in two examples. In close textual readings both examples–one vernacular, one elite–are shown to discursively craft and enact different notions of citizenship vis-a-vis the European refugee crisis. We conclude that a rhetorical perspective on public civic discourse is useful in virtue of its close attention to discursive creativity as well as to textual properties that may significantly, but often implicitly, affect citizens’ understanding of their own role in the polity, and further because it recognizes deep differences as inevitable while valorizing discourse across them.
KW - Faculty of Humanities
KW - rhetorical citizenship
KW - rhetorical analysis
KW - PeopleReachingOut
KW - New Year's Speech
KW - dissensus
KW - Rhetorical citizenship
KW - Lars Løkke Rasmssen
KW - PeopleReachingOut
KW - Refugees
U2 - 10.1080/13621025.2017.1316360
DO - 10.1080/13621025.2017.1316360
M3 - Journal article
SN - 1362-1025
VL - 21
SP - 570
EP - 587
JO - Citizenship Studies
JF - Citizenship Studies
IS - 5
ER -
