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In The Humblest May Stand Forth: Rhetoric, Empowerment, and Abolition,
Jacqueline Bacon examines the antislavery activism and the rhetoric
of abolitionists who were African Americans or women. Often excluded
from organizations dominated by white men, these activists developed
a diverse array of empowering rhetorical strategies to argue against
slavery and for civil rights. While traditional historical treatments
of the abolition movement often focus on its white male participants
or emphasize the work of more well-known African Americans, Bacon
considers a diverse range of participants, including both noted
abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth as
well as less-familiar figures such as William Whipper, Charles Lenox
Remond, Maria Stewart, and Sarah Douglass.
Examining primary sources such as letters and editorials in periodicals,
proslavery and antislavery tracts, and domestic manuals, the book
probes antebellum notions of race and gender and the ways these
conceptions influenced abolitionists' arguments. Bacon explores
the various rhetorical strategies, both traditional and less conventional,
abolitionists who were African Americans or women used to persuade
in different settings and before diverse audiences. She also considers
the legacy of this rhetoric in the discourse of late nineteenth-
and twentieth-century activists Ida B. Wells, Archibald Grimké,
Malcolm X, and Audre Lorde.
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PRAISE FOR The Humblest May Stand Forth:
"Bringing together and comparatively analyzing the various
rhetorical strategies of African American men, white women, and
African American women, Bacon accomplishes much. . . This comparative
analysis is the basis for the book’s most valuable contribution
to rhetorical analysis and studies of nineteenth-century abolition
literature and history."
Dana D. Nelson, University of Kentucky
in The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society
"This book . . . is an excellent and important contribution
to studies of antebellum print discourse, abolitionist history,
and the history and theory of rhetoric."
Nina Baym, American Historical Review
vol. 108, no. 5, p. 1453
"The Humblest May Stand Forth is significant for at
least two reasons. First, Bacon surveys the rhetoric of historically
marginalized figures in the abolitionist movement. …Perhaps
even more importantly, though, through an exhaustive examination
of primary source material including letters, diaries, speeches,
and contemporary periodicals, Bacon argues that, despite their marginalized
status, these rhetors were not only able to assume agency and rhetorical
authority in a society that denied them voice and power, they used
societal limitations on their rhetorical authority to distinct advantage.
…Despite a masterful command of rhetorical theory, Bacon is
a historian first, and her focus on the individual rhetor is one
of the strengths of this work. …If we wish to write more masterful
rhetorical scholarship, The Humblest May Stand Forth is precisely
the kind of tool we need."
David Gold, Rhetoric Society Quarterly
(by permission of RSQ)
"This thorough, important, and compelling study joins numerous
others that consider rhetorical techniques African American slaves,
male and female, and white female abolitionists used during the
19th century. Bacon examined a daunting array of primary sources
to unearth the writings and speeches of a broad range of abolitionists,
slave and free. …Recommended with enthusiasm for upper-division
undergraduates and above."
R. B. Shuman, Choice
For a complete list of Bacon's publications, click
here.
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