Rhetoric & Public Affairs Mar 2013

The Nurses of Bataan: Liberating Wartime Heroes from Melodrama

Valerie N. Wieskamp

Abstract

Abstract This essay addresses rhetorical implications involved in naming national “heroes.” I show that contemporary discourse holds narrow conceptions of heroism that limit who may be granted agency in social narratives and do so by examining one of the quintessential forms of heroism in the United States, namely, wartime heroism. Dominant constructions of “heroism” follow a melodramatic frame that privileges masculine, individualistic actors who rescue the weak by eliminating or conquering the enemy. By examining undertold stories of nurses interned in the Philippines during World War II, I explore rhetorical resources that might broaden this frame to help us envision a “healing heroism.”

Journal
Rhetoric & Public Affairs
Published
2013-03-01
DOI
10.14321/rhetpublaffa.16.1.0029
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Open Access
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Topics
rhetorical criticism discourse analysis
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