The Rhetorical Success of Thabo Mbeki's 1996 “I Am an African” Address

Abstract

Thabo Mbeki's 1996 “I Am an African” address, delivered on the occasion of the Constitutional Assembly's passage of a new constitution for a truly democratic South Africa, was successful and memorable. Three strategies account for its success: its use of what Bakhtin termed “stylization,” which allowed the rhetor to invest the speech with the aura of John F. Kennedy; its strategic shifting from the first-person singular to the first-person plural; and, most important, its construction of a narrative history of South Africa that, modeled on Scripture, celebrates the South African people's past, present, and future.

Keywords:

• Bakhtin
• Bible
• Consubstantiality
• Kenneth Burke
• Mbeki
• Narrative
• South Africa
• Stylization

Notes

Mbeki's address is available at numerous Web sites. I am quoting the text available at http://www.southafrica.info/ess_info/sa_glance/government/mbeki.htm. This text offers no page numbers; thus, page numbers are not provided in my analysis.

A version of this essay was presented at the November 2004 meeting of the National Communication Association in Chicago.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Theodore F. Sheckels

Theodore F. Sheckels (PhD, Penn State, 1979) is a professor in the Department of English and Communication at Randolph-Macon College.