Apologising to the stolen generations: Argument, rhetoric, and identity in public reasoning

Abstract

Since the appearance of the Bringing Them Home report in 1997, text and talk about the appropriateness of a national apology for the past practices of forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families and communities have appeared on a regular basis in national and local print media, on television and radio, In organised community meetings, and also in everyday discussions between ordinary people. This paper employs a critical discursive approach to analyse the ways in which common argumentative forms, discursive practices, and rhetorical devices were deployed in 104 emailed comments to a newspaper website that either denied or asserted the appropriateness of a national apology. Our analysis emphasises the constructive nature of discourse: the ways in which discursive practices constitute objects and events in particular ways and with particular consequences. Specifically, we identify a number of rhetorically self-sufficient arguments that were deployed in these texts, as well as focusing on the strategic management of stake and interest, and the construction of membership categories and entitlements. The analysis is located within the discursive literature on “race” and racism, and serves, more generally, to illustrate the ways in which issues of identity underpin broader cultural and political debates about “nationhood”, “race”, and “ethnicity”.