Rhetorical Hiccups: Disability Disclosure in Letters of Recommendation

Rhetoric Review Mar 2009

Rhetorical Hiccups: Disability Disclosure in Letters of Recommendation

Amy Vidali University of Colorado Denver

Abstract

This article positions letters of recommendation as important and troubling indicators of faculty beliefs about diversity and access in higher education. I focus on the disclosure of disability, both by examining the history of disclosing stigmatized difference and by analyzing five letters of recommendation for an aspiring graduate student with a traumatic brain injury. I suggest that faculty must revise their letter-writing practices and engage in a type of rhetorical forecasting that questions well-intentioned disclosures of difference and imagines how various letters form a composite sketch of a candidate.

Journal: Rhetoric Review
Published: 2009-03-16
DOI: 10.1080/07350190902740042
Open Access: Closed
Topics: disability studies

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (5)

Tuckley et al. (2024)

Situating Evaluation and Authority: Direct Sponsorship in Letters of Recommendation

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Glavan (2020)

Toward a Personally Situated Approach to Advocacy: Expanding Community-Engaged …

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Tomlinson et al. (2018)

Epideictic Rhetoric Born Digital

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Hitt (2015)

Dis/Identification with Disability Advocacy: Fraternity Brothers Fight against …

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Bruland (2009)

Rhetorical Cues and Cultural Clues: An Analysis of the Recommendation Letter in…

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Vidali (2007)

Texts of Our Institutional Lives: Performing the Rhetorical Freak Show: Disabil…

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College English

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