Part One

We have spent our first weeks defining rhetoric and black women's rhetoric. We have talked about rhetoric as more than just formal speeches and looked at dance, music, and graphic art.  Now, we need to build a historical foundation. There is no better way to introduce these histories than repeat the first lines of chapter one in Shirley Wilson Logan’s book: Nineteenth-century African American women were full participants in the verbal warfare for human dignity. 

The abolition of slavery, the fight for women’s rights, campaigns against white mob violence and lynching, and the work of “uplifting the race” were achieved through the public writings and speeches of black women and the everyday battles they kept alive.  Though this might seem like a chronological ordering of the syllabus since we are starting at the 1800s here, let’s instead think of this as an ancestral ordering.  What were the spaces that got cleared for us to think and make a better world by these women?  What are the battles we need to take up that are left for us, even though it is 200 years later?
Read chapter one from Shirley Wilson Logan’s “We are Coming”: The Persuasive Discourse of 19th Century Black Women (pp. 1 -22).  

​We are building on to the rhetorical framing that we did with Jackie Royster's book so you will do a similar kind of activity for this day of class.  After your reading, you need to do some think-writing. This means that you are, again, just getting ideas down on paper to bring to class with you to discuss.  This can be in the form of notes, bulleted points, stream-of-consciousness.  

Take any five aspects/sections of Logan’s work and discuss how her ideas influenced you.   Use Logan’s work to come up with your own definition of African American women’s rhetoric. Use Logan's work to also discuss how your definition builds on to what you read and said about Royster's work. Plan to write at least 2 pages.  In class, we will build a communal chain.

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Part Two

I had an instinctive feeling that the people who have little or no school training should have something coming into their homes weekly which dealt with their problems in a simple, helpful way... so I wrote in a plain, common-sense way on the things that concerned our people.
~Ida B. Wells

Choose any ONE chapter to read from Shirley Wilson Logan’s “We are Coming”: The Persuasive Discourse of 19th Century Black Women (choose from chapters 2 through 6). Your job here is to know your chapter really well as the group members who you will meet with may not have covered the same materials.  

We are going to do something a bit different from the usual text-based assignment and vary things up a bit here.  The information that we are covering with Logan's book pushes us to think deeper about black women's rhetorics and it ALSO pushes us to KNOW black women's history at the same time.  So let's make sure we are getting both lessons.  

Read your chapter and create a "PROFILE" of the woman/women centered in the chapter and bring that to class.  That profile has to include:

1. images of the woman/women, place, and time that the chapter addresses;
2. words/quotations you find inspiring (tell who said them and why), and
3. a discussion of the impact and significance of black women's rhetoric (describe how this woman engaged "verbal warfare for human dignity").  If you can throw sound into the mix, go for it.  ​​

You are, essentially, creating some sort of artifact for class--be as creative as you like, just follow those three requirements.  If you do something digital, please bring your laptop/iPad to class to show your classmates what you have done. If you do something visual-graphic (small poster, photo album, etc), please bring that item to class.  If you need supplies or any other assistance, see Carmen ASAP.

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Part Three

By this point, we have some definitions of black women's rhetoric and we have also looked closely at historical context. But nothing can replace ACTUALLY reading these black women's speeches and letters!!!  Today, you will spend some time with any one of these women: Anna Julia Cooper, Fannie Barrier Williams, Frances Watkins Harper, Ida B. Wells, Maria Stewart, Sojourner Truth, Victoria Earle Matthews, Hallie Quinn Brown, Selena Sloan Butler, Mary V. Cook, Georgia Swift King, Lucy Laney, Adella Hunt Logan, Lucy Wilmot Smith.

Find 2 paragraphs (MAX) that you will read aloud to the class that impacted you most (bring the text with you or copy the excerpt into your assignment).  Then write at least a one-page response to the rhetor as if you are talking to her.  Be prepared to read both of your 2 paragraphs and your 1 page response aloud!  PLEASE BRING THE ACTUAL TEXT TO CLASS WITH YOU...PRINT IT OUT!

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