Description
Book SynopsisOffers an incisive exploration of the limitations and possibilities of democratic discourse for resolving conflicts in urban communities. Candice Rai roots her study of democratic politics and publics in a range of urban case studies focused on public art, community policing, and urban development.
Trade Review“Democracy’s Lot is one of the most interesting, original, and important studies I have read in a long time. Not only a fascinating story about gentrification and resistance in the contemporary North American city, it’s also a model of original sociological research, using a methodology the author calls ‘rhetorical ethnography,’ which combines the deep, sustained, social immersion of ethnography with the detailed, critical discourse analysis of rhetoric. Above all, Rai makes a timely, ground-breaking intervention into the study of contemporary democracy, putting the lie to both uncritical celebrations of free and open public spheres and radical critiques of democracy in the era of neoliberalism.” —David Fleming, author of
City of Rhetoric: Revitalizing the Public Sphere in Metropolitan America""Candice Rai presents an innovative methodological framework that employs textual analysis and fieldwork to study the interactions of housing debates, street protests, public art, visceral bodily responses, and new media technologies. Fieldwork presents an exciting opportunity to expand the field of inquiry for rhetorical scholarship that typically lies outside of our reach. However, Rai adds to and extends this line of inquiry by drawing explicit connections between text-centered rhetorical themes and concepts (like topoi) and the field as a place of rhetorical practice.” —Robert Asen, coeditor of
Public Modalities: Rhetoric, Culture, Media, and the Shape of Public Life
