Black Radical Rhetoric(s): A Case Study in Black Youth Activism
Channel: Havens Wright Center for Social Justice
Date: 2022-09-25

A lecture by Shanara Reid-Brinkley examining the college debate circuit, a majority-White, interracial context, where Black debate students actively questioned the structure and form of the education practice that they participated in, revealing that not all education matches the cultural backgrounds students possess, changing the debate form in the process.

Shanara Reid-Brinkley is currently a Visiting Scholar in the Humanities Center at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research is in the areas of Rhetoric, Critical Cultural Studies, Media Studies, African American Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies, and Urban Studies. She specializes in the study of race and gender in public address and advocacy and media and culture. Each area oscillates around my interest in African American representation, culture, politics, history and performance in the U.S. context. Her current book project is tentatively titled, Young, Black and Political: Radical Activism, Argument Culture and Civil Society, which centers black youth politics and activism in the educational context. How do black youth discuss race-centered political questions and what kinds of rhetorical and bodily performances do they utilize to engage in public argument?