As scholars, teachers, administrators, and students in rhetoric and composition, an interdisciplinary field of inquiry that studies the power of language, discourse, and communication, we head to Portland, Oregon, this week to attend the biennial conference of the national professional academic association, the Rhetoric Society of America. I am thinking of the Rhetoric Society of America’s abysmal failures on Palestine.
Aghast and breaking at the unimaginable horrors being inflicted by Israel and the US on the occupied peoples and lands of Palestine that we were witnessing, over a hundred scholars, teachers, administrators, and students in the field of rhetoric and composition quickly came together in November 2023 to issue the Rhetoric and Composition Scholars/Teachers/Administrators/Students for Palestine statement and call on our major national professional academic associations, including the Rhetoric of Society of America and the Conference on College Composition and Communication, “to stand in solidarity with Palestine and Palestinians under occupation, speak up, take action.”
The Rhetoric Society of America and the Conference on College Composition and Communication, two of the most prominent professional academic associations in our field, stayed silent, declined to say anything, refused to take a stand, failed to take any action for justice in Palestine, as I previously delineated and that led subsequently to a gathering of spirit, a coming together of rhetoric and composition scholars, teachers, administrators, and students in the face of these shameful silences.
The Rhetoric Society of America executive director sent two short emails in response to our statement: “RSA acknowledges receipt, and the Board will discuss,” followed by “the RSA Executive Committee conferred, and consulted with the full board. RSA will not be producing a statement at this time.”
The Conference on College Composition and Communication didn’t bother to even respond to our statement, although its then leader had the outstanding idea in February 2024 to invite a few colleagues, including a “content creator” at the Zionist Hillel International, to join a “Special Committee on Difficult Dialogues and Politically Charged Discussion Within and Beyond the Classroom” in order to “study, talk, and write together a usable, actionable guide for teachers, scholars, and writing program administrators.”
Mind-boggling that the leader of the Conference on College Composition and Communication would think that a guide on how to have difficult conversations (with Zionists!) was the exigent tool needed for these horrific times—and the only action that the Conference on College Composition and Communication could take.
Mind-boggling that the Rhetoric Society of America Executive Committee and full board of influential, pedigreed rhetoricians determined that silence was the pertinent response to the litany of ghastly crimes and genocide Israel and the US were committing in Palestine.
The Rhetoric Society of America still has made no statement, taken no action for justice in Palestine, even as the horrors Israel and the US are inflicting on Palestinian lives and lands compound, even as it proclaims on its website: “The Rhetoric Society of America is committed to public facing research, teaching, programming, commentary, training, and engagement in rhetorical studies to confront urgent concerns.” Shamefully, the Israeli/US genocide of Palestinians is not urgent enough concern for the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders to confront—nor the horrors Israel and the US are now unleashing in Lebanon and Iran.
Many of my friends and colleagues will return to the Rhetoric Society of America conference, even as the Rhetoric Society of America has continually failed us. I understand the impulse. I understand the biennial conference is, despite the odds, a space of community and kinship for many scholars, teachers, administrators, and students. I almost allowed myself to be persuaded into attending this year’s upcoming Rhetoric Society of America conference, even though I had declined attending the last Rhetoric Society of America conference in 2024 and ruled out attending another Rhetoric Society of America conference. When friends and colleagues invited me to join a special session, “Silence is Complicity: Rhetoricians for a Free Palestine,” I accepted, heeding the call to keep talking about Palestine. When the time came to commit to attending the conference, though, I found myself unable to go through with it. I couldn’t bring myself to justify paying the dues to rejoin the morally bankrupt Rhetoric Society of America to present at its conference as a member, or to pay the outrageous non-member registration fee of $700 (money I would rather donate to any number of fundraisers for Gaza). I couldn’t bring myself to overlook the fact that almost three years into the Israeli/US genocide of Palestinians, the Rhetoric Society of America has yet to utter a word about Palestine, let alone take any action for justice in Palestine.
I respect my Rhetoricians for a Free Palestine comrades who will travel to Portland to underscore at the Rhetoric Society of America conference that the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders’ silence on the Israeli/US genocide in Palestine is complicity. I call on my Rhetoricians for a Free Palestine comrades to make clear in no uncertain terms that the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders’ failure to confront this grave moment and take a stand for justice in Palestine—the bare minimum—is unforgivable. The crucial pressing moral, ethical, and humanitarian issue of this moment, the question of Palestine, is a key litmus test, one that the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders have failed abysmally. And it is simply unacceptable and shocking that the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders, esteemed rhetoricians with impressive credentials, have had nothing to say about Palestine.
So while I respect my Rhetoricians for a Free Palestine comrades and the interventions they will make at the Rhetoric Society of America conference, I am convinced that the Rhetoric Society of America is rotten at the core, morally decrepit, and cannot be salvaged, and we must abandon these associations that don’t serve us, have never really served us—those of us whose interests and imaginations are not aligned with hegemonic white US Americanness. After all, the Rhetoric Society of America, an association with dubious beginnings (founded by white men with blinkers), has never had our interests at its heart.
Our interests and our hearts have always been, and remain, peripheral within the Rhetoric Society of America. I was incredulous and angry when a few weeks after the devastating US missile strikes on the Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in Minab, Iran, as our hearts were aching and we were grieving, and grieving the dire conditions in Cuba created by intensifying US blockades, the Rhetoric Society of America executive director sent out an email with the subject heading “You’re killing me, Smalls”—a reference, the executive director explained, to the film The Sandlot—reflecting “on my despair that you have not yet registered for the conference.” I recognize the attempt at humor, and humor is necessary, but this? This is what the Rhetoric Society of America executive director is despairing over, even if it’s just in jest, during these disquieting times, as the US and Israel are wreaking havoc in the world, causing untold global misery? It seemed like a slap in the face, peak US-centric callousness—symptomatic of the blinkers of today’s Rhetoric Society of America leaders.
But this is de rigueur for these academic associations, such as the Rhetoric Society of America and the Conference on College Composition and Communication, that have never truly cared for us, for our lives and our dreams, for our anguish, for the heaviness we feel acutely in our bones and in our hearts, despite their avowed commitments to equity, inclusion, access, diversity, and decolonization.
If it can’t or won’t use its power and voice to speak up for justice when the times call for it, wherever they call for it, what is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America? If it won’t use the power it has to shape and affect public discourse about Palestine, what is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if it won’t use its voice and resources for justice in Palestine? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if it won’t make noise, take action, and stand up for justice in Palestine? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if its interests align with the interests of US hegemony? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if it won’t rise up against injustice? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if it won’t condemn genocide? What is the point for us of the Rhetoric Society of America if it will not and cannot even condemn scholasticide?
The point is that the Rhetoric Society of America has failed, failed us all gravely. Palestine has exposed irrevocably the moral decay that is the Rhetoric Society of America.
As rhetoric and composition scholars, teachers, administrators, and students from across the US and the world assemble at the Rhetoric Society of America conference, let us recall and confront the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders’ chilling silence on Palestine. Let us not forget it, and let us never ever allow the Rhetoric Society of America and its leaders to rewrite/downplay/erase their damning silence on Palestine. Let us damn the Rhetoric Society of America and let us use our voices and work tirelessly for a liberated Palestine.