The Skeleton on the Couch: The Eagleton Affair, Rhetorical Disability, and the Stigma of Mental Illness

Rhetoric Society Quarterly Nov 2010

The Skeleton on the Couch: The Eagleton Affair, Rhetorical Disability, and the Stigma of Mental Illness

Jenell Johnson University of Wisconsin–Madison

Abstract

In 1972, vice presidential candidate Thomas Eagleton revealed to the American public that he had been hospitalized for depression on three occasions. The revelation seriously damaged the campaign of his running mate, George McGovern, and eventually led to Eagleton's dismissal from the ticket. This article seeks to understand the Eagleton Affair by showing how the stigma of mental illness functions as a form of rhetorical disability. Using a reading of stigma in ancient Greece and the work of Erving Goffman, this article argues that stigma can be viewed as a constitutive rhetorical act that also produces a disabling rhetorical effect: kakoethos, or bad character.

Journal: Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Published: 2010-11-15
DOI: 10.1080/02773945.2010.517234
Open Access: Closed
Topics: disability studies

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (15)

McDonald-Dressler (2025)

“They Had No Teeth”: Rhetoric, Absence, and the Ghosts of Pennhurst

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Gruber et al. (2024)

A Forum on Neurorhetorics: Conscious of the Past, Mindful of the Future

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Heinze et al. (2023)

What Is the Sound of One Hand Playing: Aural Body Rhetoric in the Music of Hora…

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Musgrave (2022)

The Rhetoric of Corporate Psychopathy: Neoliberalism, Personhood, and Demonizat…

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Larson (2021)

The Rhetoricity of Fat Stigma: Mental Disability, Pain, and Anorexia Nervosa

Rhetoric Society Quarterly

Show all 15 →

Randall (2021)

Consent as Rhetorical Ability in “The Strange Case of Anna Stubblefield”

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Cannon et al. (2021)

Re/producing Knowledge in Health and Medicine: Designing Research Methods for M…

Technical Communication Quarterly
Johnson et al. (2020)

Introduction: Disability, In/Visibility, and Risk

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Gerdes (2019)

Trauma, Trigger Warnings, and the Rhetoric of Sensitivity

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Rothfelder et al. (2017)

Man Interrupted: Mental Illness Narrative as a Rhetoric of Proximity

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Uthappa (2017)

Moving Closer: Speakers with Mental Disabilities, Deep Disclosure, and Agency t…

Rhetoric Review
Holladay (2017)

Classified Conversations: Psychiatry and Tactical Technical Communication in On…

Technical Communication Quarterly
Keohane (2016)

“Honest Toil”: Labor, the Body, and Citizenship in the Knights of Labor, 1880–1890

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Molloy (2015)

Recuperative Ethos and Agile Epistemologies: Toward a Vernacular Engagement wit…

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Moe (2012)

Revealing Rather Than Concealing Disability: The Rhetoric of Parkinson's Advoca…

Rhetoric Review

Cites in this index (2)

Owens (2009)

Confronting Rhetorical Disability

Written Communication
Hauser (1999)

Aristotle on epideictic: The formation of public morality

Rhetoric Society Quarterly

Also cites 19 works outside this index ↓

10.1111/1741-5705.00023

↗
Aristotle .Nicomachean Ethics. Trans. Terence Irwin . Indianapolis , IN : Hackett Publishing , 1999 . Print .

↗
10.1080/00335638809383833

↗
10.1080/10462939809366216

↗
10.1023/A:1021353631347

↗
10.1111/j.1741-5705.2009.03731.x

↗
Gustafson Mark. (2000)

Written on the Body: The Tattoo in European and American History

↗
10.2307/300578

↗
10.1521/jscp.1997.16.4.405

↗
10.4324/9780203359433

↗
10.1111/j.1600-0447.2006.00824.x

↗
10.2307/3791896

↗
Rountree Clark. (2001)

10.1525/rh.2001.19.3.293

Rhetorica ↗
10.1215/10642684-9-1-2-233

↗
10.1016/j.socscimed.2008.07.007

↗
10.1093/alh/13.4.737

↗
Sluiter Ineke (2008)

Kakos: Badness and Anti-Value in Classical Antiquity

↗
10.1093/mind/LXXVII.306.155

↗
10.2975/30.2006.46.53

↗

CrossRef global citation count: 34 View in citation network →