Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing and Rhetoric Apr 2011 Open Access

Richard Allen and the Prehistory of Engaged Community Learning at HBCUs

Elizabeth Kimball

Abstract

This essay argues that African American church founder Richard Allen (1760-1831) developed a rhetorical pedagogy that prefigures the community literacy partnerships of later Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). While Allen did not enjoy the material opportunities of institutionalized higher learning, we can interpret passages from his autobiography as a rhetorical pedagogy that affirms the ways of knowing in language of his community, suggests a relationship between language and the truth, and points toward a community pedagogy rooted in language. Allen also figures as a rhetor whose own higher literacy is sponsored by his community, and who returns his rhetorical power to the community for its own betterment. These same dimensions can be witnessed in the pedagogies of later nineteenth-century African American educators, particularly that of Fanny Jackson Coppin of the Institute for Colored Youth, and Daniel A. Payne of Wilberforce University. Moreover, Allen’s very lack of formalized schooling affords us a way of reframing contemporary efforts in university and community partnerships, and offers compelling precedent for Linda Flower’s model of inquiry. For African American higher learning, community literacy partnerships are not merely an additive element of a traditional curriculum; instead, they are the lifeblood of the school itself.

Journal
Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing and Rhetoric
Published
2011-04-01
DOI
10.59236/rjv10i2pp17-37
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Topics
rhetorical criticism writing pedagogy literacy studies race and writing community literacy
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References (28) · 1 in this index

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