Critical rhetoric and the issue of drug control: A rhetorical commentary on contemporary discourse in the American war on drugs

William Norelli Elwood, Purdue University

Abstract

The author analyzes rhetoric that addresses the public policy issue of drug control that identifies groups of people who reportedly constitute "the drug problem." Because people rarely experience a body of discourse regarding a single issue at one time, the author assembles discursive fragments to represent a rhetorical text. These include presidential drug war declarations, drug war news stories, Partnership for a Drug-Free America (PDFA) announcements, and first-person recountals of drug addicts. This dissertation assumes a postmodern orientation and a critical rhetoric perspective. A postmodern orientation is appropriate for this work because it provides a realm for scholars to argue for a specific assemblage of discursive fragments, to question the political reality the assembled text seemingly creates, and to look to the discourse of the subjects the text creates to explore the text's influence as the subjects themselves define it. A critical rhetoric perspective empowers scholars to explain discursive fragments that constitute our contemporary experience. Postmodern rhetoric is the contemporary fragmented presentation of messages involved with the preservation of status quo power relations that compete for public acceptance to define public and private realities. As a field of study, it examines discourse that involves issues and issue-related human subjects in ways that support or oppose power/knowledge regimes. Presidential drug war declarations state that drugs threaten all Americans, but are limited primarily to cities. News stories extend presidential articulations and provide examples of independent, minor drug war victories--extending presidential knowledge that drugs constitute a minority problem that minorities can solve without Federal assistance. PDFA messages further extend the idea that "the drug problem" is limited to Others, or not-white-men: women, children, and Hispanic- and African-Americans. White men only are concerned or victimized individuals. Drug addicts' stories reveal awareness that power/knowledge defines them as Others; however, they recount practices that subvert power/knowledge regime apparatus toward their own ends. The author concludes that "the drug problem" is a problem not for the powerful who express it, but for the citizens the discourse declares to be enemies, for the people involved in the apparatus that the powerful declare will resolve it, and for Americans who live with the lack of resolutions that emanate from the discursive formations of the drug war. The discursive war on drugs perpetuates a status quo of individuals with discursive power, access to ample financial resources, and the ability to enact policies that empower those who maintain the imbalance in the current state of power relations.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

Schiappa, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Communication

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