Anzaldua and Campbell

     Much great work has already been done here, and I apologize for posting so late. There are, however, a couple of claims I would like to make about the contributions of these two (women) authors).

     Others have addressed the ways in which Anzaldua emphasizes the effects of language on consciousness and identity, particularly those of the marginalized. Indeed, she provides multiple accounts of negotiating Spanish, English, and Chicano/a as a way of connecting to the spirit, to the land, and to a hybrid identity. Specifically of the Chicano/a, which are denied a position in either English or Spanish hegemonic structures, Anzaldua asks “What recourse is left to them but to create their own language?” (77). For me, this argument heralds an argument that Suresh Canagarajah makes later in the rhetorical tradition. In her text (though not in the excerpt we read for class), Anzaldua specifically addresses code switching: the ability to switch (fluently) between multiple languages. Canagarajah takes this one step further with his concept of “code meshing,” wherein multiple languages are combined. This is, in part, where we get the concept of World Enlglishes. One piece Anzaldua adds to the rhetorical tradition is this linguistic/cultural hybridity. Her theories of borders and borderlands allow us to look forward to more globalized societies and the rhetorical choices we make as we negotiate geographic, linguistic, and cultural borders.

     I must admit, however, that the most fascinating claims that I thought Anzaldua made were about images and their relationship to her composing process. She states: “an image is a bridge between evoked emotion and conscious knowledge; words are the cables that hold up the bridge. Images are more distinct, more immediate than words, and closer to the unconscious. Picture language precedes thinking words; the metaphorical mind precedes analytical consciousness.” (91). In her framework, images and words operate together/simultaneously/cyclically. In fact, it seems that image and word are inextricable in Anzaldua’s understanding of literacy and the composing process, which is an argument that I find both provocative and insightful. This claim is a different take on multimodality and multimodal literacy, one that doesn’t a difference of kind in print-textual or visual literacies.

     Campbell I found less interesting though no less important. Her argument is presented in a fairly methodical logical problem: women’s liberation is a consciousness more than a movement; consciousness must be awakened; here’s how women’s rhetoric works; and here’s how women’s rhetoric (in its antirhetorical nature) solicits the awakening of consciousness. Campbell’s most provocative claim, I believe, concerns the radical-ness of the women’s rhetoric: “The listener must either admit that this is not a society based on the value of equality or make the overt assertion that women are special or inferior beings who merit discriminatory treatment” (126). Campbell suggests that the very act of women speaking in a public sphere violates social norms. Thus, for the audience to hear and to understand, the audience must make a choice. In her time period, the choice, I think, would have had more severe consequences than it had now, which raises an interesting concern for me. Much of the study of rhetoric in recent times seems to be about the expansion of the canon to reclaim marginalized voices (across time and space). How long is it before something radical becomes something canonical? Is the answer to that question important? I’m not sure, but I think it might provide some insights into the ways in which we take up new voices, new rhetors, and new rhetorics and what we do with them in the intellectual space of the academy.