Copyright 2006 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
310 Rhetorical Maneuvers: Subjectivity, Power, and Resistance Kendall R. Phillips A sense of subjectivity as uid, dynamic, and multiple has become almost or- thodox throughout the humanities. The widespread inuence of poststructural thought has seemingly routed earlier Enlightenment notions of a unied, tran- scendent subject and opened the door for critical approaches to the numerous and changing manifestations of human subjectivity. The uidity of the human subject, however, is not without its bounds or constraints. Indeed, the same line of poststructural thinking that served to de-center the Enlightenment subject, especially the work of Michel Foucault, also stipulated that the subject was positioned by larger formations of discourse over which they had limited if any control. These two sides of poststructural subjectivityits uidity and its positioningestablish not so much two divergent approaches, but the two poles between which the human subject can be thought to operate. In turn the two poles of the apparent xity of the subject position and the seeming uidity of the subjectivity manifested within that position suggest the kind of productive ten- sion through which we are simultaneously limited and enabled by the discourse formations within which we operate and against which we, at times, resist. This productive tension between the multiplicity of the subject and the singularity of the subject position has, of course, been the focus of numerous inquiries. In his later work, Foucault attended to the processes by which the subject makes itself an object upon which work might be done and urged a more aesthetic approach to the continuous crafting of the self. 1 Along similar lines, J udith Butler has conceived of the subject in terms of its performativity and the ways that the I is crafted through numerous and uid citations of existing power relations. Conceived in this way, the notion of the self is a constantly changing object crafted and re-crafted out of the points of identication provided in the exterior elds of power and knowledge. These points of identication, in turn, provide symbolic anchors by which a subject is moored, at least temporar- ily, into a particular subject position within which they become identiable and intelligible in terms of the broader formation of discourse. 311 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS In addition to posing a serious challenge to Enlightenment philosophy, this conception of the self as uid and dynamic presents some vexing questions con- cerning the practices of self and the capacity of a subject to offer any meaningful challenge to the formations of discourse that constitute its existence. As Butler puts the problem, The paradox of subjectivation (assujetissement) is precisely that the subject who would resist such norms is itself enabled, if not produced, by such norms (1993, 15). The theoretical concerns over the relationship be- tween agency and subjectivity also impact upon a series of political questions surrounding the nature and possibility of identity politics and recent debates concerning the importance and efcacy of gaining recognition as a political move. 2 Whatever ones position within such debates, it is clear that the question of subjectivity and its concomitant questions of subjectivation and agency must be addressed in order to conceive of any kinds of democratic politics. The question of the subject, then, clearly entails broad philosophical and political implications. Rhetorical scholars have entered this conversation with a particular concern for the practices that both constitute and challenge the constitution of the self and many of these scholars have attended specically to the points of friction between prescribed positions in which a subject is con- stituted and the dynamic nature of subjectivity as performed. Following from the works of Foucault, Barbara Biesecker (1992), for instance, urges attention to the canon of style as a crucially rhetorical element in the processes by which the individual negotiates relations of power, knowledge, and subjectivity. In a similar vein, Bradford Vivian draws from the works of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari to suggest that rhetoricians recognize that the self may be conceived as a forma rhetorical formthat exists only in its continual and aesthetic creation, in its indenite becoming (2000, 304). The indenite nature of this becoming is, for both Vivian and Deleuze and Guattari, a politically crucial insight into the ways that subject form becomes not a trap within which the self is necessarily conned but a potentially creative resource through which new senses of self may emerge. The present article seeks to make a modest contribution to this expansive body of theory by pressing the question of how the multiplicity of the subject is practiced or, to phrase it as a driving question, what kinds of procedures might be employed to turn the tensions that exist between subject-multiplicity and subject-positioning into a rhetorical resource? How does, we might ask, one speak from ones sense of multiplicity and how does multiplicity emerge within the everyday practices of self? Theoretically it is clear that the tension between uidity of multiplicity and the seeming xedness of positionality informs daily 312 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS practices of the self but, what remains to be more fully explored are the kinds of procedures by which this tension is manifested within everyday practices. Undoubtedly, there are numerous ways in which this tension is manifested and in the present essay I seek to inquire into the specic procedures of one such manifestation, which I call a rhetorical maneuver. In the simplest terms, the rhetorical maneuver is performed at those moments when we choose to violate the proscriptive limits of our subject position and speak differently by drawing upon the resources of another subject position we have occupied: for example, when the corporate CEO speaks as a mother, or when the university professor speaks as a Latino. As I will elaborate in the following pages, this is a rhetori- cal movement in which one violates the constraints of one subject position by articulating the discourse more appropriate to another subject position. While this is only one way in which the tension between subject position and subject multiplicity is performed, it seems an intriguingly familiar example and, as such, warrants a more thorough examination. In order to facilitate the unpacking of this specic procedure, I begin this essay by laying out some of the relevant theoretical literature concerning subjectivity and then, in order to attend more closely to its everyday practice, I map the rhetorical maneuver along lines of- fered by Michel de Certeau in his inuential book, The Practice of Everyday Life. Following this explication of the procedures of the rhetorical maneuver, I return to the broader theoretical and critical concerns over subjectivity by of- fering some implications. Subjectivity Positioned and Performed The underlying tension I attend to in this essay is captured by Stuart Hall, who writes, The subject assumes different identities at different times, identities which are not unied around a coherent self. Within us are contra- dictory identities, pulling in different directions, so that our identications are continually being shifted around (1996a, 277). For Hall, these identications are the points of contact between the subject and the broader discourses, or as he contends, identity is: The point of suture, between on the one hand the discourses and practices which attempt to interpellate, speak to us our hail us into place as the social subjects of particular discourse, and on the other hand, the processes which produce subjectivi- ties, which construct us as subjects which can be spoken. Identities are thus the 313 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS points of temporary attachment to the subject positions which discursive practices construct for us. (1996b, 56) While I chose to not pursue Halls psychoanalytic understanding of these points of identication, it is worth observing the tension between the multiplic- ity of identities carried by a subject and the positioning of that subject by a seemingly unied and coherent position within which they become authorized to speak and act. Subjectivity, conceived in this way, is always a tension between the positioning carried out by the formations of discourse within which we act and the uid multiplicity of subjectivity against which such positions are employed. On the one hand, the subject comes to act by being positioned within broader and impersonal systems of discourse and these positions, in turn, help to craft ones sense of self. Vivian makes the point that, discourse creates subjects by rst creating subject positions from which to speak (2000, 313). These enabling discourses, in turn, as Sarah Tracy and Angela Tretheway observe, work to x identities in particular ways that favor some interests over others and thus constrain alternative truths and subject positions (2005, 171). On the other hand, even though limited through its positioning within discourse, subjectivity remains indeterminate and is always in the unpredict- able process of becoming. The discourses that serve to x subjectivity into a particular subject position, as Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe observe, can provide only a partial x (1985, 111). The inability of discourse to provide a nal, xed and unchangeable subject position is due, in part, to the disjuncture between various formations of discourse and the dispersion of subject positions across these various discourses. Instability is introduced into these discourse formations by the movement of the subject from one discursively constructed position to another. As we move between discoursesand, thus, between subject positionswe carry with us the alternative subject positions and discourses and through our movement introduce a degree of instability, an unxed-ness, into the different subject positions we occupy. On this point, Vivian insists that in order to understand the uidity of subjectivity, we must assert the movementthe processof becoming and the encounter with difference it creates (2000, 307). The movement of individuals among and between subject positions is essential to conceive of subjectivity as uid and dynamic. Crucial to understanding the potential of this movement in terms of the uid nature of subjectivity and the partially xed character of subject positions and to the larger point of the present essayis the conception of subjectivity as the taking on of various forms. Our conception of self, as Vivian denes it, is 314 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS created through the adoption and crafting of various forms of self (311). Foucault makes this point when contending that the practices by which a subject crafts their sense of self are nevertheless not something that the individual invents by himself. They are patterns that he nds in his culture and which are proposed, suggested and imposed on him by his culture, his society and his social group (1994, 11). The instability of discourse, however, prevents this imposition from being complete and the movement of the subject provides a crucial space in which an element of creativity can be introduced. Felix Guattari provides a useful metaphor for thinking about this relationship when he notes, One creates new modalities of subjectivity in the same way that an artist creates new forms from the palette (1995, 7). In this metaphor the subject-as-artist is afforded a level of creativity but only in so far as new forms can be derived from the palette, which is presumably made up of previously encountered forms. It is worth observing here the interrelationship between positions of sub- jectivity and the forms afforded the subject. Any given subject position provides a position in a broader formation of discourse within which a subject is afforded a kind of social existence, a position of intelligibility within a formation of dis- course and, subsequently, some degree of agency within that discourse. These subject positions also provide a recognized and recognizable form of subjectiv- ity appropriate to that subject position. In other words, a subject position is an intelligible place within a broader formation of discourse, while a subject form is that recognizable pattern of performance attached to a given position. Ken- neth Burkes notion of form as the creation of expectations and their fulllment is appropriate for thinking about the way that a given subject position creates the expectation that one will perform in a way that subsequently satises this expectation. 3 The position of a university professor, in other words, may have a degree of latitude in its expectations but there are some apparently obligatory expectationsattending classes, giving grades, etc. As noted above, the apparently indissoluble link between a given sub- ject position and its appropriate subject form is not as xed and necessary as it may appear. The movement of a subject between various positions provides a potential for disruption. Here we might combine Guattaris creative palette metaphor with Foucaults more dire observation about the imposition of pat- terns of self. The subjects movement between various forms of self, imposed upon it in the different positions it inhabits, ultimately provides a palette of multiple patterns of self. This palette of acquired forms, in turn, provides one of the important conditions for the creation of new senses of self. Following the interrelationship of subject form and subject position it seems likely that if one is able to alter the form of ones subjectivity within a given formation of 315 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS discourse, then one will affect ones subject position within that discourse as well. Potentially, this alteration of subject position may affect the broader con- stellation of the discourse formation as well. In other words, to challenge ones own intelligibility within a network of relations that render one intelligible is to potentially proffer not only a challenge to ones sense of self but also to the disciplinary networks that seek to position one. It is a challenge to the points and practices of identication through, to borrow from Butler, the institution of a disidentication. Challenges to points of identication that anchor one within a given sub- ject position reveal the interdependency of the subject position and the subject who performs within that position. It is not merely the case that the position enables the performance but, importantly, the performing subject perpetuates the existence and contours of the position within which it performs. In turn, performances that violate the expectations of a given subject position will un- dermine the points of identication of the position itself. As Butler notes, it is not the case that a subject-position preexists the enunciation that it occasions, for certain kinds of enunciations dismantle the very subject positions by which they are ostensibly enabled (1993, 100, 114). Taken as an abstract theoretical principle, the notion of the creative sub- ject drawing on prior forms of subjectivity in order to challenge their position within a formation of discourse and reform it seems sensible. What remain to be explored are the kinds of procedures through which this reconstruction is performed. In this regard, rhetoricians seem uniquely positioned to explore these kinds of re-formations of subjectivity given that such procedures may entail not only the deployment of discourse but the invention of new positions within discourse. In the end, the positioning and re-positioning of a subject within a broader formation of discourse is always a matter of explicit behaviors. One is positioned by discourse into a position from which one can speak, but one also actively participates in this positioning by performing those functions prescribed to that position. In turn, one can reposition oneself through the kinds of things one says and does. Thus, positioning and repositioning are active processes and in order to more fully grasp the complexity of these processes rhetorical schol- ars need a set of terminology. The theoretical language currently available to rhetorical scholars pursuing these procedures is rich, as is demonstrated above, but also remarkably abstract. In the remainder of this essay, I suggest a conception of one procedure through which a subject attempts to recongure her/his position. At the root of this concept is the notion of speaking out of placeor, what happens when one speaks the discourse appropriate to a different subject position. This seems 316 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS a particular manifestation of the classical notion of catachresis, the improper use of a word or stretching of a metaphor. More recently catachresis has been employed by scholars like Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and Butler to capture the ways that those who are erased from a form of discourse, such as the colonized within the discourse of colonialism or the feminine within the discourse of patriarchy, re-emerge in odd terms. As Butler puts it, catachresis entails those gures that function improperly, as an improper transfer of sense, the use of a proper name to describe that which does not properly belong to it. 4
The rhetorical maneuver is a particular variation on this concept because it involves, in a way, the improper use of proper name. But in this particular case, the rhetorical maneuver involves the importation of a proper name (or subject form) from another formation of discourse and into a discursive position for which this proper name is somehow inappropriate. Such mis-naming of ones self, in turn, challenges the contours of the subject position and the proper subject form it encourages. While some conception of self-naming and -performing has always been part of discussions of the subjectconcepts like persona or ethoswhat seems relevant here is the deployment of the new/improper name against the proscriptive contours of an existing subject position. It is the turning against the pre-existing expectations one arrives in by virtue of being in a given posi- tion within a formation of discourse. The integrity of a given subject position is maintained in large part through notions of appropriateness via decorumthe sense that given ones position one is entitled to speak in certain ways and about certain things, but also limited in these regards. Performing within the bounds of ones subject position provides for certain levels of social rewards, at the very least the lack of censure or disciplining, while the violation of the bounds of decorum which surround ones position can lead to various forms of social punishment. 5 Perhaps the greatest danger in violating ones position is the possibility of exclusion and, therefore, a kind of social death. Our desire to maintain our position is, therefore, part of our desire for social survival. Butler describes this desire when noting, Where social categories guarantee a recognizable and enduring social existence, the embrace of such categories, even as they work in the service of subjection, is often preferred to no social existence at all (1997, 20). The multiplicity of subject positions through which we move, however, also affords a multiplicity of potential social existences and, as such, a multi- plicity of interests and desires. The memories of these past positions, then, may create a potential space in which to formulate challenges to ones present position. Whatever the underlying motivation, it is clear that within the practices of ev- 317 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS eryday life violations of ones subject position do occur, sometimes accidentally and sometimes with calculation and, given the preceding theoretical analysis of subjectivity as position and form, these moments of transgression should prove potentially productive. The same power relations that dictate the position and form from which one speaks also, simultaneously, provide a form of agency that is a potential tool for resistance and reformulation. As Butler notes, The power that initiates the subject fails to remain continuous with the power that is the subjects agency. A signicant and potentially enabling reversal occurs when power shifts from its status as a condition of agency to the subjects own agency (12). 6 In other words, the same power relations that impose a position and form on the subject also provide the space from which an altered subject form can be articulated and, thus, the power relations of subjectivation are, at least momentarily, reversed. It is to one form of this movement of subjectivity that I now turn. The Rhetorical Maneuver Lets begin with a fairly mundane example. After class a student ap- proaches me and states, Ive missed some work in the last week and would like to make it up. Now, at this point, the regular rules of discourse are in placeI am in the superordinate position and the student in a subordinate one. We are both speaking from established positions within a larger formation of discourse and, up to this point, speaking within the appropriate forms as student and professor. However, the student continues, I think my girlfriend is pregnant and weve both been really upset. Now, as the professor of the course I am still within the same regulatory space and, in this case, still fully capable of invoking my discursive authority and saying no. However, the student has made this no more difcult by the story of the possibly pregnant girlfriend. As noted, this is a mundane and typical example of faculty-student interaction. Most of us who teach have become almost numb to the numerous births, deaths, illnesses, and breakdowns that are invoked to excuse late or poor work. However, its banal nature is instructive to the extent that it suggests how common the creative shift in subjectivity is. In this very common example, the student is seeking to disrupt the regular patterns of both his and my subject po- sitions through the invocation of a different subject formnamely, that of his impending fatherhood. It is worth noting that the students subject positionas 318 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS a student in a university classroomhas not changed, but the subject form he invokes is notably not that of a student in a university classroom. The key to this resistant effort is the movement of subject form within the prescribed subject position. Arriving in an appropriate subject position studentthe resistant actor then articulates a, literally, inappropriate subject formpotential father. In this situation, of course, the notion of impropriety is dened by the lines of expectation and decorum established within this discur- sive space. One does not, at least in most cases, expect to discuss a students impending parenthood in a course about, say, rhetorical theory. In spite of the inappropriateness of this move, it is not hard to see how frequent this type of resistant act is. We have labels for many of these resistant moves based on sub- jectivity: coming-out, playing the race card, even passing. Each of these is an example whereby the resistant actor seeks to undermine or outmaneuver spatial relations of power towards some potential advantage. As noted earlier, my focus here is not on the interiority of the moving subject as in Butlers work, nor on the subject form itself, as with Vivian, but on the movement of subjectivity as a rhetorical resource through which the agency provided by a subject position is turned against that position. In attempting a more praxis-grounded approach to the movement of subjectivity, I will map this maneuver by following the templates of practice suggested by Michel de Certeau in The Practice of Everyday Life (1984). I utilize de Certeau as a template for a number of reasons. First, his work has proved remarkably inuential within American rhetorical studies as a means of attending to the practices of power and resistance. 7 Second, de Certeaus approach to power and resistance can be placed in a productive dialogue with the work of other poststructural theorists, especially Foucault. Indeed, de Certeau characterized much of his work as a kind of corrective against what he perceived as the more monolithic depictions of power rendered by Foucault and others and, in this way, de Certeaus attempt to map the quotidian spaces of authority and moments of resistance provides a useful model for conceiving of the individual practices of resistant subjectiv- ity. 8 Finally, a theory of the subject is mysteriously absent in The Practice of Everyday Life. 9 While the book is dedicated to the common man who moves anonymously among elds of power, the notion of a subject and the ways in which subjectivity is also implicated within practices of power and resistance is largely ignored. It seems appropriate here to briey adumbrate the relevant points of de Certeaus theory of practice. In The Practice of Everyday Life, de Certeau bifur- cates power and resistance along an axis of space and time. Power, according to de Certeau, is maintained via strategies, which are those relations of power 319 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS deployed as a means of maintaining order and control. The crucial aspect of strategies, in de Certeaus work, is their reliance on spatial relations: A distinction between strategies and tactics appears to provide a more adequate initial schema. I call a strategy the calculation (or manipulation) of power relation- ships that become possible as soon as a subject with will and power . . . can be isolated. It postulates a place that can be delimited as its own and serve as the base from which relations with an exteriority composed of targets or threats . . . can be managed. (1984, 3537) As de Certeau elaborates this notion, strategies function to turn spaces into proper places, to maintain propriety and order through surveillance and panoptic practice[s], and to produce knowledge by their ability to transform the uncertainties of history into readable spaces (36). As suggested in the above quotation, strategies of power are opposed by the tactics of resistance available to those who are not provided a proper place of power. While differences in power certainly play a role in distinguishing strategies and tactics, the key distinction is the opposition of time to space. As de Certeau elaborates: Strategies are actions which, thanks to the establishment of a place of power (the property of a proper), elaborate theoretical places (systems and totalizing discourses) capable of articulating an ensemble of physical places in which forces are distrib- uted. . . . They thus privilege spatial relations. . . . Tactics are procedures that gain validity in relation to the pertinence they lend to timeto the circumstances which the precise instant of an intervention transforms into a favorable situation, to the rapidity of the movements that change the organization of a space, to the relations among successive moments in an action, to the possible intersections of durations and heterogeneous rhythms, etc. (38) Thus, for de Certeau, strategies are those relations based on a sense of place, while tactics are those actions based on a sense of timing. Deprived of the proper places secured by strategies, tactics are those procedures that utilize a kind of cunning intelligence to capitalize on a momentary opportunity for disrupting existing relations of propriety and, thus, the essence of the tactic is the Greek concept, kairosthe right moment in time. As de Certeau conceives it, the distinction between strategy and tactic relies primarily on the opposition of space and time. The graphic in Figure 1 illustrates de Certeaus notion. Beginning in a position of limited potential force (I), the tactic relies on the memory (II) of past events to seek the right moment in which to act quickly (thus, less time needed for preparation) (III) in order to 320 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS manifest greater effect (IV). The central components of the tacticthe trans- formation of memory of past events into rapid action at the right moment - rely on the Greek notions of mtis (a term elegantly excavated by Marcel Detienne and J ean-Pierre Vernant [1978, 11], who note that it entails a kind of cunning intelligence, an informed prudence, which utilizes memory to gain a tactical foresight) and kairos (the right moment in time for maximum effect). It is at this point, the rapid transformation, where the tactic gains its temporal validity. 10 It is also worth observing that de Certeau dissects the movement of this operation into quadrants. In the rst momentthe recognition of less Forceoccupies a quadrant of Space/Being, in which the actor recognizes the limitations on her position within networks of spatial propriety. The second momentthe use of more Memoryoccupies the quadrant of Time/Invis- ible, in which the actor utilizes the cunning intelligence of memory to gain foresight of possible moments of advantage; a covert attention to the moment. The third momentthe action that requires less Timeis essentially the exploitation of the right moment in time and occupies the quadrant of Time, be- TACTIC SPACE TIME I) less II) more FORCE MEMORY BEING INVISIBLE
OPERATING VISIBLE IV) more III) less EFFECTS TIME TACTIC SPACE TIME I) less II) more FORCE MEMORY BEING INVISIBLE
OPERATING VISIBLE IV) more III) less EFFECTS TIME Figure 1. Adapted from graphs in de Certeau (1984, 83, 84, 85). 321 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS ing opportunistic, and the Visible, as the action is now taken. The nal moment of the tactical movement is the achievement of more Effect, which occupies the quadrant of Operating/Space as the action now has its effect on the spatial procedures of propriety and, if properly executed, achieves maximum effect because of the exploitation of the moment of opportunity. An example may help to differentiate the tactic from the maneuver suggested above. In a large lecture class, students will, at times, begin anonymously but audibly closing book bags and shufing paper during the last few minutes of the class. This tactical ruse is designed to trick the instructorwho has spatial authorityinto believing the class period has come to an end and, therefore, dismiss the students. This is tactical because it relies on timing; the ruse, for instance, would hardly have a chance of working if performed during the rst ten minutes or even during the middle of the class period. Returning to the question of subjectivity as a resource for resistance, it should be clear that the kinds of social rewards and threats of exclusion that encourage a subject to willingly subject themselves to the dictates of a given position and its appropriate form are, essentially, spatial strategies of power. The capacity to be recognized within a space of discourse and the threat of be- ing erased from this space, or at least censured within it, are clearly the kinds of relations that are involved in the maintenance of proper spaces. While tactics provide one means for resisting the propriety of proper spacethrough the exploitation of that moment when the strategic eye of power is turned else- where or the stable rhythms of a readable space are momentarily disruptedthe tactic does not adequately explain the resources for resistance provided by the multiplicity of subjectivity. Thus, I will suggest as a friendly amendment the addition of the rhetori- cal maneuver to de Certeaus conception of strategies and tactics. Paralleling de Certeau, the rhetorical maneuver is a calculated action determined by the multiplicity of possible subjectivities, 11 and can be dened as: the articulation of an inappropriate alternate form of subjectivity within an already dened subject position. Unlike tactics, which gain validity through time, or strategies, which gain validity through space, the rhetorical maneuver gains its validity from the multiplicity of subject forms and the disruptive potential inherent in articulating an inappropriate subjectivity. I chose maneuver in order to parallel de Certeaus terms and to capture the movement or procedure intended as a skillful or shrewd step toward some objective 12 and add the term rhetorical because the inappropriate subjectivity must be articulated. This notion of articulation is borrowed from Laclau and Mouffe, who dene it as practices that establish relations among elements such that their 322 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS identity is modied as a result of the articulatory practice (1985, 105). Here the elements being modied begin with the types of discourse appropriate to a subject positionas dened by strategic, spatial relationswith the potential to further modify the constraining spatial relations of the discourse formations themselves. Thus, the rhetorical maneuver involves the articulation of a subject form that is inappropriate. It is worth stressing here that, in this context, the notion of appropriate or inappropriate is dened by the spatial strategies of a given discourse formation and it is important to recognize that propriety is another point of identication through which subject form is tied to subject position. There may be, however, instances in which these limits of positional propriety run counter to the interests of the person occupying that position. Hence, from a resistant standpoint, inappropriate discourses will, likely, be the most useful and effective type of discourse. Analytically, this sense of the inappropriateness of a given subject form may not be as immediately identiable. As Ill discuss in more detail later, some discourse formations may provide a considerable amount of latitude concerning ones subject form, while others may provide a fairly circumscribed set of pos- sibilities. For critics seeking to examine an instance of a rhetorical maneuver, the question of the propriety of a given subject form can only be determined by examining the history of that given subject positionin terms of the rewards and punishments afforded to previous utterancesand by attending to the kinds of reactions a given maneuver provokes. In Figure 2, I suggest the ways that the rhetorical maneuver parallels the tactic while remaining a distinct action. Beginning in a position in which the desires of the actor are constrained by their subject position (hence a poor t) (I), the actor again utilizes memory (II), but here it is not a recollection towards opportunistic foresight but of past/alternate subject forms embodied in previ- ous subject positions. This alternate subject form is then articulated, which creates a point of disunity within the subject speaking position (III), resulting in the displacement of the speaking subject (IV) andpotentiallythe regula- tory spatial relations that constrain that subject position. Or, to return to my mundane example, the student-as-student is in a weak position to achieve his desired results (I: less t), and re-calls the alternate subject form of impending fatherhood (II: more memory). Upon articulating the discourse of this alternative subject form, his position of student-as-student becomes less unied through the introduction of student-as-father (III), resulting in a displacement of his regular subject position andat least momentarilythe strategic discourse regularly directed at him (IV). 323 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS In seeking to conceptualize the maneuver in ways parallel to de Certeaus notion of tactic, I have utilized the same quadrant conguration, with one notable change. Where de Certeau divided Space and Time along the vertical axis, I have divided SpaceSubject Position and SubjectivitySubject Form. Thus, strategic spatial relations provide a subject position and an appropriate subject form, but at the moment of articulation, the subject may choose an alternative form, one that is inappropriate and, therefore, disruptive. As with the tactic, the rhetorical maneuver can be thought of as mov- ing through four quadrants. The rst movementthe recognition of a poor t between desire and the constraints of the proper subject positionoccupies the quadrant of Space/Being. Interestingly, this is the same quadrant from which the tactic originates and, thus, suggests that tactics and maneuvers bear a close relationship in the sense that ones subject position is in some way inadequate to ones purposes. The second movementthe utilization of memory to recall alternate forms of subjectivityoccupies the quadrant of Subject/Invisible MANEUVER SPACE SUBJ ECTIVITY Subject Position Subject Form I) less II) more FIT MEMORY BEING INVISIBLE
OPERATING VISIBLE IV) more III) less DISPLACEMENT UNITY MANEUVER SPACE SUBJ ECTIVITY Subject Position Subject Form I) less II) more FIT MEMORY BEING INVISIBLE
OPERATING VISIBLE IV) more III) less DISPLACEMENT UNITY Figure 2. The rhetorical maneuver. 324 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS because it is the surreptitious re/collection of inappropriate, alternate subject forms. The third movementthe articulation of the discourse of the inappropri- ate subject formprovides a spectacular dissolution of the apparent unity of a subject position and, thus, occupies the quadrant of Subject/Visible. The nal movementthe effect of the dis-unifying, inappropriate subject form upon the place of the subject position within the broader formation of spatial rela- tionsoccupies the quadrant of Space/Operating as it is here that the modica- tion of the strategically positioned subject may occur. While good timing may increase the effect of displacement, the key to the rhetorical maneuvers validity is its deployment of discourse from an alter- native, and thus inappropriate, subject form. There is no reason to believe that the introduction of inappropriate subject-discourse is necessarily dependent on a particular moment. Indeed, to the contrary, where de Certeau makes the point that a tactic is dependent on an occasionthe occasion is taken advantage of, not created (1984, 86)the maneuver has the potential to create an occasion through the displacement of strategic relations of subject positions. The articu- lation of an inappropriate subject form challenges those points of identication through which a subject is rendered intelligible and identiablea moment of dis-identication in Butlers termand, as such, threatens to displace those strategic relations deployed to maintain intelligibility and order. It is not difcult to recognize both the commonness of such a maneuver and its potential benets for those seeking to redene their place in a broader formation of discourse. Coming out as gay or lesbian, while undoubtedly fraught with difculties, may, potentially, create an occasion in which relationships (familial, profes- sional, social) can be redened in a way perceived as benecial to the person making the maneuver. While timing may be a factor, the rhetorical maneuver itself is in no way dependent on a prior occasion and, thus, is distinct from de Certeaus notion of a tactic. Beyond being theoretically distinct from the tactic and the strategy, the rhetorical maneuver provides a means for conceptualizing the ways that the processes of subjectionthe strategic ways in which we are interpellated into a subject position and the means by which we are disciplined into being within that position via a particular subject formalso provide resources for disrupt- ing these processes. Subject positions, thus, must be thought of as ambivalent, as providing a limiting form of agency but an agency that can be used against the very strategic relations of power that authorize it. As Butler conceives this, Power acts on the subject in at least two ways: rst, as what makes the subject possible, the condition of its possibility and its formative occasion, and second, as what is taken up and reiterated in the subjects own acting (1997, 14). Each 325 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS reiteration of the subject, however, is not identical to its predecessors and these shifting iterations of the subjects form provide the means by which the relations of subjectivation can be resisted, reversed, and transformed. Implications By introducing the notion of a rhetorical maneuver into the theoretical and critical language related to subjectivity, of course, I hope to do more than merely amend the works of Michel de Certeau. If the concept has any purchase, then it should provide some new avenues towards thinking about those points of slippage between the positioning of the subject and the discursive forms through which the subject acts within those positions. In the nal section of this essay, I sketch out at least three of these potential avenues: agency, artistry, and memory. One of the most vexing problems raised by poststructural theories of the subject has been the question of agency, a question that has received consider- able recent attention within American rhetorical studies. 13 At the heart of this problem is the question of how a subject who is both positioned and formed by relations of power can acquire an agency that can be turned against this power. The movement of a rhetorical maneuver suggests this potential agency is located in the space in between the subject position and the subject form. The subject may be positioned by relations of power, but once so positioned they may choose to risk performing an alternative and inappropriate form of subjectivity. By choosing to speak differently than the form prescribed by a subject position, the subject invokes the agency provided by a position but invokes it as a reaction against the contours of that position. Butler approaches the same problem when contending, Agency exceeds the power by which it is enabled. One might say that the purposes of power are not always the purposes of agency (1997, 15). The rhetorical maneuver is one mechanism through which the purposes of agency are able to escape the purposes of power. A conception of the rhe- torical maneuver may provide a critical lens through which this play of agency against power might be more clearly understood. The agency acquired in the rhetorical maneuver, of course, also entails a degree of risk. Some maneuvers, perhaps like that of my nervous student, hold little potential risk while others, perhaps coming out as gay or lesbian, may hold considerably greater dangers. In part, the degree of risk seems tied to the apparent permanence of the power relations which serve to position a 326 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS subject. Coming out among a group of close and liberal-minded friends might hold comparatively little risk, where coming out to fundamentalist relatives may hold considerably greater risk. In both instances, a rhetorical maneuver is being performedan articulation of an alternative subject form within an established subject positionhowever, the distinction is of the rigidity with which the subject form is perceived as inextricably tied to the subject position. It might also be worth thinking of subject positions as being either tighter or looser depending on the acceptable variance in subject forms allowed. Certainly there are some positions that we occupy that afford us a great deal of latitude, or looseness, in the ways we perform in that position, while others do not. In turn, it seems likely that the degree to which the agency achieved by a rhetorical maneuver is able to affect the relations of power is also correlated to this sense of rigidityor tightnessand risk: the more rigid the positioning relations of power are then both the more risk entailed and the more potential agency for displacing those relations. Agency, therefore, must be conceived not only in terms of power and the resistance to power, but also in terms of the risks entailed by invoking it. 14
The performance of this reconguring entails a kind of turning or twist- ing of ones self against the dened contours of ones position and this kind of turning seems to be the essential character of a rhetorical maneuver. The ap- propriately positioned subject embodies one particularand sanctionedform, but in the invisible realm of the subjects being, she also contains the memory of alternative forms of being, which can be thought of as hidden facets of the self. The rhetorical maneuver, thus, is a kind of turning of the subject in which the turn reveals one of these unexpected alternative forms. This turn, in turn, can be thought of as twisting the strategic relations of power that positioned the subject in the rst place and, in that subsequent twisting, creating the potential for a transformation or reversal of those power relations. 15
This notion of the turn, or trope, suggests some of the important rhetorical dimensions of this movement. At one level, returning to the previous discus- sion of risk and agency, Hayden White points out that the trope is in essence a deviation from customary language and this deviance is a crucial element in the workings of a trope. As Nietzsche explores in his On Truth and Lies in a Non-Moral Sense, once the deviance of a trope has been lost, its potential for inventiveness has also been lost. Humans are able to live in a secure world of stability only by allowing ourselves to forget the deviance of our metaphors and by forgetting that he himself is an artistically creating subject (2001, 1176). Rhetorical maneuvers, as a kind of trope, then will also become com- monplace as the successful maneuver transforms the nature of the subject posi- tion against and within which it was employed. The transformative potential of 327 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS such a maneuver is related, at least in part, to the amount of deviation from the prescribed form of that position. And, in turn, its success is measured by the eventual acceptance of the new subject form as acceptable, even typical. Conceiving of the rhetorical maneuver as a kind of trope also, of course, suggests that it be understood in terms of a kind of rhetorical artistry. All turns are not equal and one of the ways they can be distinguished is in terms of a kind of aesthetic dimension recognized as a kind of rhetorical artistry. Guattaris palette, one might say, still relies on the artistic ability of the subject wielding the brush. In this regard, Bieseckers urging that rhetorical scholars recognize the canon of style as crucially related to the interplay of subjectivity, power and knowledge is echoed here. The rhetorical maneuver involves not simply a turn, but a turn in the form of being, which Foucault thought of as a kind of aesthetics of existence; a continual re-crafting of the self. In this regard, style can be seen as embedded in the classical concern for ethosthe presentation of self to others. 16 Seen in this way, the rhetorical maneuver involves trading in ones establishedor positionedethos for one that is not already accepted within a particular space. The introduction of this new subject form involves a deeply artistic ethos, to use Aristotles term, in that the introduced, inappro- priate subject form relies purely on its artistic rendering and not on any prior expectations or assumptions. There are numerous examples of this kind of artistic movement of ones ethos within the realm of public address. Richard Nixon effected this kind of move during the Checkers Speech in which his position as political-gure was rearticulated through his invocation of the subject form of humble family man and protective father who had no intention of returning his childrens cocker spaniel. A similar, albeit somewhat less effective, maneuver was attempted by Bill Clinton during his initial response to the Lewinsky hearings. In attempt- ing to reposition himself as a wounded private man the president declared, Now this matter is between me, the two people I love mostmy wife and our daughterand our God. I must put it right and I am prepared to do whatever it takes to do so. Nothing is more important to me personally. But it is private and I intend to reclaim my family life for my family. Its nobodys business but ours. Even presidents have private lives (1998). In both instances, political gures maneuvered their subjectivity and sought to utilize their private/famil- ial subject forms as a means of gaining political advantage. In Nixons case, the maneuver was markedly successful; his detailed description of his humble background and loving family saved him the vice presidency and salvaged his political career. In Clintons case, his brief, terse remarks to the nation did little to spare him the ramications of the Lewinsky scandal or the impeachment that would come only a few months later. While there are, undoubtedly, numerous 328 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS factors related to the success and failure of these two addresses, it seems likely that the rhetorical artistry with which each sought to recongure their public ethos is one. Finally, in addition to the rhetorical maneuvers political and critical implications there is at least one potentially interesting avenue for theoretical exploration: the relationship between memory and resistance. Memory occu- pies the crucial second step of the rhetorical maneuver and it is this sense of memory that deserves additional attention. As an initial step in conceiving of this resistant memory it is worth recalling Foucaults notion of counter-memory. For Foucault, counter-memory is an utterly different type of historical gesture, one that separates occurrences from the assumed metaphysical underpinnings of meaning, identity, and telos. One of Foucaults senses of counter-memory is worth quoting at length here, where he notes the way history is used in: the systematic dissociation of identity. This is necessary because this rather weak identity, which we attempt to support and to unify under a mask, is in itself only a parody: it is plural; countless spirits dispute its possession; numerous systems intersect and compete. The study of history makes one happy, unlike the metaphy- sicians, to posses in oneself not an immortal soul but many mortal ones. (1977, quoting Nietzsche, The Wanderer and His Shadow, 1880, 17). The memory involved in the rhetorical maneuver resembles Foucaults sense of this genealogical counter-memory in that it relies on the recollection of the multiple subject forms derived from the multiple subject positions a person has occupied and that this recollection functions to dissipate the illusion of a unied subjectivity (or, in Nietzsches sense, the singular immortal soul.) Foucaults discussion of genealogical counter-memory, of course, is in terms of a broader mode of social critique. There is, however, a related concept from Foucaults later work that is more focused on the notion of individual subjectivity. The notion is thought, of which he explains: Thought is free- dom in relation to what one does, the motion by which one detaches oneself from it, establishes it as an object, and reects on it as a problem (1997, 117). As Ive discussed more fully elsewhere (2002), thought occurs at those points of contradiction between overlapping senses of identity and is crucial in the process of inventing new discourses.
As with the genealogical counter-memory, thought disrupts existing notions of identity, but, in addition, thought entails the possibility of constructing new forms of subjectivity and, in so doing, new contours in a subject position. The notion of a rhetorical maneuver provides a way of conceiving the relationship between counter-memorythe disruptive process of recollecting 329 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS alternative subject positions and discoursesand thoughtthe process of prob- lematizing ones subject position and inventing new subject forms. By conceiving the movement between the (counter)memory of alternative subject forms and the disruptive articulation of these forms, the rhetorical maneuver suggests the way counter-memories can be transformed into an inventional moment from which disruptive discourses might emanate. 17 Additionally, the rhetorical maneuver adds to Foucaults two concepts the vital element of a performative articulation and the potential for rhetorical intervention and invention.
Conclusion The tension between the uidity of the human subject and the constraining nature of the subject position has important implications for our understanding of the nature of subjectivity and its processes of becoming in the world. This tension is not solely a matter of the theoretical nature of the subject but also bears importantly on the practices of the subject as it seeks to negotiate the space in between its multiplicity and its position within discourses that seek to x it. I have introduced the notion of a rhetorical maneuver in order to elaborate upon one particular procedure through which this tension becomes a resource by which the subject may redirect the agency of its position against the very relations of power/knowledge that seek to position it. Rhetorical maneuvers, as conceived, seem to be remarkably pervasive actions: when a person asks to leave work early to pick up a sick child or in- vokes their professional expertise in a family gathering or articulates their ethnic heritage in a political debate. Each of these instances involves the invocation of some alternate subject form within a formation of discourse that positions one differently (i.e., as worker, or son, or citizen). Sometimes these maneuvers become so commonplace that they become part of the expected form itselffor instance, the Family and Medical Leave Act has institutionalized the familial responsibilities of the worker. At other times, however, the rhetorical maneuver may more dramatically deviate from the prescribed form and, in so doing, afford both more risk and more potential for disruption and change. As a critical concept, the notion of a rhetorical maneuver suggests ex- amination of precisely those moments when the individual subject invokes some alternate subject form and in violating the limits of their prescribed position seeks to perform differently. The seemingly ceaseless turning of the human subject within and against the contours of its various positions speaks, 330 KENDALL R. PHILLIPS ultimately, not only to the nature of the subject but also to its seemingly end- less potential for drawing upon the resources of memory, agency, artistry and rhetorical invention. 18 Department of Communication and Rhetorical Studies Syracuse University Notes 1. Foucault conceptualized his later work as attending to the arts of existence, which he un- derstood as those intentional and voluntary action by which men not only set themselves rules of conduct, but also seek to transformthemselves, to change themselves in their singular being, and to make their life into an oeuvre that carries certain aesthetic values and meets stylistic criteria (1985, 1011). 2. The debates over recognition as a political strategy have been driven largely by the relationship between political recognition and pursuits of resource redistribution. This question has been most directly pressed in on-going debates between Nancy Fraser and Axel Honneth (see Fraser [1996], and Fraser and Honneth [2003]) as well as Fraser and J udith Butler (see Butler [1998] and Fraser [1998]). The present essays introduction of the rhetorical maneuver seems to have implications for the issue of recognition and mis-recognition but the depth and complexity of these debates necessitates that these implications be more fully explored in some subsequent discussion. 3. Burkes notion of conventional formseems most applicable here. On this formhe notes, We might note, in conventional form, the element of categorical expectancy. That is, whereas the anticipations and gratication of progressive and repetitive formarise during the process of reading, the expectations of conventional formmay be anterior to the reading (1953, 12728). 4. See Spivak (1993) and Butler (1993, 37). 5. On this point, conversation analysts have produced interesting and provocative work on the on-going process of positioning within conversation and further suggested the importance of propriety within these positions. On this point see Davies and Harr (1999). 6. It is also worth noting here that for the purpose of the present essay I ambracketing Butlers larger project of interrogating the space in between Freud and Foucault. Butlers work in The Psychic Life of Power is focused on the interior nature of the subjects desire of subjection. My purpose here is the ways that subjection is recongured rhetorically. While there is clearly an important point of connection between this reconguring and the desire for change, in the present essay I can only gesture towards this connection. 7. De Certeaus work features in a number of recent rhetorical studies essays, such as Bates (2003), Bergman (2003), Erickson (1998), Hartnett, (1998), Nakayama and Krizek (1995), and Stormer (2002). 8. De Certeau seems to have conceived at least some of his work in opposition to Foucault; see de Certeau (1984, esp. chap. 4; 1998, esp. sec. 4). 9. Indeed, the beginnings of the present essay arose fromthe ways that Thomas Nakayama and Robert Krizek utilized de Certeau in their essay on whiteness. The pervasive and anonymous authority of whiteness was conceived in terms of de Certeaus notion of spatial strategy, a move that seemed sensible. But, the resistant discourses of non-whites were conceived as tactics. Given the reliance of tactics on a notion of timing, this equation of racial discourses with tactics pointed, at least to me, to a theoretical failing in de Certeaus bifurcation of power and resistance based on space and time. 10. It is worth noting here that the notion of a rhetorical maneuver also seems to rely heavily on the broad kind of cunning intelligence embodied in mtis. Elsewhere in their discussion of this Greek concept, Detienne and Vernant observe that, The many-coloured and shimmering nature of mtis is a mark of its kinship with the divided, shifting world of multiplicity in the midst of which it operates and a bit later, Mtis is itself a power of cunning and deceit. It operates through 331 RHETORICAL MANEUVERS disguise. In order to dupe its victims it assumes a formwhich masks, instead of revealing, its true being (1978, 21). 11. A close parallel to de Certeaus phrase (1984, 37). 12. See Websters New World Dictionary (1988, 821). 13. The question of agency was one major component of the 2003 Alliance of Rhetoric Societies meeting in Chicago. The wrangling over the relationship between agent, agency and subjectivity has continued in productive and contentious ways. See Geisler (2004; 2005) and Lundberg and Gunn (2005). 14. Butler puts the point eloquently: The subject is compelled to repeat the norms by which it is produced, but that repetition establishes a domain of risk, for if one fails to reinstate the norm in the right way, one becomes subject to further sanction, one feels the prevailing conditions of existence threatened. And yet, without a repetition that risks lifein its current organizationhow might we begin to imagine the contingency of that organization, and performatively recongure the contours of the conditions of life? (1997, 29). 15. In her work, Butler also attends to the tropological nature of the subject but, as noted earlier, her attention is on the formation of the subject where my attention here is on the rhetorical perfor- mance of that turn. Butler emphasizes the turning inward or back upon ones self; my focus is on the turning outwards of one of ones selves. 16. In regards to ethos, consider the ways that Foucault conceived of it as the practice of self on self (1994, 6). 17. 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