Abstract

This essay argues for attention in cultural rhetorics scholarship to stories as effective civic pedagogical tools informed by participatory knowledge-making practices. Drawing on a multiyear “mobile cinema democracy project” based on the physical circulation across Africa, Europe, and North America of a successful African democratic story told in the multi-award-winning documentaryAn African Election, I attend to both the documentary and its larger contextual project, “A Political Safari: An African Adventure in Democracy Building.” I demonstrate the ways that the African storytelling traditions of collaboration upon which this project rests offer us cultural rhetoricians key opportunities to reimagine inclusive knowledgemaking practices in using stories as civic pedagogies. My analysis reveals how such knowledge-making practices might orient our work against the grain of hierarchical, exclusionary, colonial practices and toward decolonial approaches that are truly participatory and inclusive.

Journal
College Composition and Communication
Published
2023-09-01
DOI
10.58680/ccc202332671
Open Access
Closed
Topics

Citation Context

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Cites in this index (3)

  1. Rhetoric Review
  2. College English
  3. College Composition and Communication
Also cites 7 works outside this index ↓
  1. Story Movements: How Documentaries Empower People and Inspire Social Change
  2. Dewey for a New Age of Fascism: Teaching Democratic Habits
  3. Another Step Forward for Ghana
    Journal of Democracy  
  4. The Successful Ghana Election of 2008: A Convenient Myth?
    The Journal of Modern African Studies  
  5. An African Election directed by Jarreth Merz
    African Studies Review  
  6. Epistemic Freedom in Africa: Deprovincialization and Decolonization
  7. Storytelling in the African World
    Journal of the African Literature Association  
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