Reality Bites: Rhetoric and the Circulation of Truth Claims in U.S. Political Culture

About this book

Fake news alternative facts post truthterms all too familiar to anyone in U.S. political culture and concepts at the core of Dana L. Clouds new book Reality Bites which explores truth claims in contemporary political rhetoric in the face of widespread skepticism regarding the utility ethics and viability of an empirical standard for political truths. Cloud observes how appeals to truth often assumemistakenlythat it is a matter of simple representation of facts. However since neither fact-checking nor truthiness can respond meaningfully to this problem she argues for a rhetorical realismthe idea that communicators can bring knowledge from particular perspectives and experiences into the domain of common sense. Through a series of case studiesincluding the PolitiFact fact-checking project the Planned Parenthood selling baby parts scandal the Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden cases Neil DeGrasse Tysons Cosmos the rhetoric of Thomas Paine and the American Revolution and the Black Lives Matter movementCloud advocates for the usefulness of narrative myth embodiment affect and spectacle in creating accountability in contemporary U.S. political rhetoric. If dominant reality bitesin being oppressive and exploitativeit is time Cloud argues for those in the reality-based community to bite back.