Porous Protest and Rhetorical Performance: Democratic Transformation at Occupy
Porous Protest and Rhetorical Performance: Democratic Transformation at Occupy
What follows considers whether harnessing word (argument) and action (occupation) constitutes a transformative democratic performance. In this, I am not seeking to replace the Aristotelian concept of performance, nor its transformative aspect, but I do ask how appropriate it is to confine mimetic acts of protest to an Aristotelian dialectic. The “efficacy debate” is a central issue for practitioners and scholars of political performance and I shall not question the truth of such claims that to be a performance the event must transform its audience in some way. Rather, I question, as others have, the ability for the performance of protest to effect any kind of political change. My argument is that Occupy’s politics emerge out of its performance of rhetorical devices and strategies that put democracy on display.
Protest Movements, Public Display, Philosophy, Protagoras, Rhetoric
43-56
Millette, Holly-Gale
909906ff-426b-47ab-a71a-5788ea36c213
2015
Millette, Holly-Gale
909906ff-426b-47ab-a71a-5788ea36c213
Millette, Holly-Gale
(2015)
Porous Protest and Rhetorical Performance: Democratic Transformation at Occupy.
Essays in Philosophy, 16 (1), .
(doi:10.7710/1526-0569.1520).
Abstract
What follows considers whether harnessing word (argument) and action (occupation) constitutes a transformative democratic performance. In this, I am not seeking to replace the Aristotelian concept of performance, nor its transformative aspect, but I do ask how appropriate it is to confine mimetic acts of protest to an Aristotelian dialectic. The “efficacy debate” is a central issue for practitioners and scholars of political performance and I shall not question the truth of such claims that to be a performance the event must transform its audience in some way. Rather, I question, as others have, the ability for the performance of protest to effect any kind of political change. My argument is that Occupy’s politics emerge out of its performance of rhetorical devices and strategies that put democracy on display.
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Porous Protest and Rhetorical Performance Democratic Transformat
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Published date: 2015
Keywords:
Protest Movements, Public Display, Philosophy, Protagoras, Rhetoric
Organisations:
Winchester School of Art
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Local EPrints ID: 376799
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/376799
ISSN: 1526-0569
PURE UUID: 3af68c14-b981-438d-981a-6d829068494c
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Date deposited: 12 May 2015 11:43
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 03:45
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