Description: A Companion to African Rhetoric argues for a holistic view of rhetoric on the continent, gives an outline of what African rhetoric is, and serves as a pivotal anthology with contributions from African, Afro-Caribbean and African American rhetoricians to understanding African rhetoric.
Review Quotes:
"A Companion to African Rhetoric does a wonderful job of introducing the diversity of concerns, objects, and approaches in the study of African rhetorics." --Kundai Chirindo, Lewis & Clark College
"A Companion to African Rhetorics is long overdue. Editors Ige, Motsaathebe, and Ochieng, along with 17 other scholars, have assembled the most comprehensive introduction--to date--to the breadth and depth of scholarship in African rhetorical traditions, showcasing surprisingly diverse theoretical origins, practices, languages, and literatures. In brilliant comparative fashion, each essay in this collection either disrupts, enriches, or troubles existing assumptions about what is (or is not) inherently African, rhetorical, democratic, and diasporic, attending to communicative theories and practices that have emerged from within--or more importantly, emerged across and between--colonial borders and contexts. Wenze kahle!" --Tarez Samra Graban, Florida State University "The first of its kind among studies of rhetoric in Africa, A Companion to African Rhetoric isa rich collection of essays covering a wide variety of rhetorical topics. With exceptional depth and scope--from deft theoretical treatises to insightful rhetorical analyses, critical commentaries, and empirical studies--the book will be a game changer in rhetorical studies, in global and comparative rhetorics. And it will likely set a new paradigm for the study of African and African Diaspora rhetorics." --Kermit Campbell, Colgate University "A Companion to African Rhetoric is a comprehensive book that seeks to unravel the hiatus between rhetoric and reality. Tapping from different academic disciplines, A Companion to African Rhetoric stretches our imagination to a point where we are persuaded that indeed, 'rhetoric' is not non-reality, but a counternarrative to what is considered commonsense. To the extent that rhetoric is constructed based on what could have been included in a text, but has not, the power of rhetoric and the rhetoric of power is elevated to a space of interpretive and political contestations. Never since Plato has the science of rhetoric become the medium of debating philosophy, politics, religion and language which are mediated in Africa. This book contributes significantly to African scholarship because the ethics of African rhetoric demonstrates an important African way of knowing and disseminating knowledge. Whether that knowledge empowers Africans always is what the reader will experience after reading the book. The book is aimed at African universities and the global knowledge marketplace of ideas where even though multi-disciplinarity is celebrated, there is uniqueness in a book whose capacity is to dialogue with other forms of knowledge within and across disciplines." --K. B. Khan, University of South Africa