Leonard Jeffries and the Paranoid Style / Lawrence M. Doss.

This paper examines and explains the elements of the paranoid style in rhetoric (first noted by Richard Hofstader in 1966) employed by Leonard Jeffries, Chairman of the Black Studies Department at City College of New York, in his July 1991 speech at the Empire State Black Arts and Cultural Festival in Albany, New York. The paper also suggests that Jeffries' use of the style reveals an element of paranoid rhetoric not specifically noted by Hofstader, i.e., the posture adopted by the paranoid rhetor, and that this posture or relativity to the audience is that of revelation. As a background for the examination of Jeffries' discourse, the paper traces the historical tradition (from 1950 onward) of radical Black rhetoric. The paper concludes that the technique of the paranoid style can be understood through Jeffries' rhetoric and that it is Jeffries' credibility as an academician which permits him to present his discourse from the rhetorical posture of revelation. (Twenty-six references are attached.) (PRA)

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