Heather E. Harris & Kimberly R. Moffitt 
The Obama Effect [EPUB ebook] 
Multidisciplinary Renderings of the 2008 Campaign

November 4, 2008 ushered in a historic moment: Illinois Senator Barack Obama was elected the forty-fourth President of the United States of America. In The Obama Effect, editors Heather E. Harris, Kimberly R. Moffitt, and Catherine R. Squires bring together works that place Barack Obama’s candidacy and victory in the context of the American experience with race and the media. Following Obama’s victory, optimists claimed that the campaign signaled the arrival of an era of postracism and postfeminism in the United States. This collection of essays, all presented at a national conference to discuss the meaning and impact of the nomination of the first presidential candidate of African descent, remind the reader that reaching a point in U.S. history where a biracial man could be deemed ‘electable’ is part of a still-ongoing struggle. It resists the temptation to dismiss the uncertainty, hope, and fear that characterized the events and discourse of the two-year primary and general election cycle and brings together multidisciplinary approaches to assessing ‘the Obama effect’ on public discourse and participation. This volume provides readers with a means for recalling and mapping out the enduring issues that erupted during the campaign—issues that will continue to shape how our society views itself and President Obama in the coming years.

Tabla de materias

List of Figures



Preface


Desiree Cooper



Acknowledgments



Introduction


Catherine Squires, Heather Harris, and Kimberly Moffitt




Section I: Rhetoric



1. White Males Lose Presidency for First Time: Exposing the Power of Whiteness through Obama’s Victory


Dina Gavrilos



2. Hermeneutical Rhetoric and Progressive Change: Barack Obama’s American Exceptionalism


James T. Petre



3. Ghosts and Gaps: A Rhetorical Examination of Temporality and Spatial Metaphors in Barack Obama’s ‘A More Perfect Union’


Sarah Mc Caffrey




Section II: New Media



4. Media Politics 2.0: An Obama Effect


Michael Cheney and Crytal Olsen



5. The Webbed Message: Re-Visioning the American Dream


Heather E. Harris



6. The Resonant Message and the Powerful New Media: An Analysis of the Obama Presidential Campaign


Qingwen Dong, Kenneth D. Day, and Raman Deol



7. Beyond the Candidate: Obama, You Tube, and (My) Asian-ness


Konrad Ng




Section III: Identities



8. Post-Soul President: Dreams from My Father and the Post-Soul Aesthetic


Bertram D. Ashe



9. ‘Let Us Not Falter Before Our Complexity’: Barack Obama and the Legacy of Ralph Ellison


M. Cooper Harriss



10. The Obama Effect on American Discourse about Racial Identity: Dreams from My Father (and Mother), Barack Obama’s Search for Self


Suzanne W. Jones



11. Our First Unisex President? Obama, Critical Race Theory, and Masculinities Studies


Frank Rudy Cooper




Section IV: Publics



12. Oprah and Obama: Theorizing Celebrity Endorsementin U.S. Politics


Rebecca A. Kuehl



13. The Obama Mass: Barack Obama, Image, and Fear of the Crowd


Robert Spicer



14. Mothers Out to Change U.S. Politics: Obama Mamas Involved and Engaged


Grace J. Yoo, Emily H. Zimmerman, and Katherine Preston




Section V: Representations



15. For the Love of Obama: Race, Nation, and the Politics of Relation


Aimee Carillo Rowe



16. Framing a First Lady: Media Coverage of Michelle Obama’s Role in the 2008 Presidential Election


Kimberly R. Moffitt



17. The Feminist (?) Hero versus the Black Messiah: Contesting Gender and Race in the 2008 Democratic Primary


Enid Lynette Logan



Epilogue


Konrad Ng



List of Contributors

Index

Sobre el autor

Heather E. Harris is Associate Professor of Business Communication at Stevenson University.
Kimberly R. Moffitt is Assistant Professor of American Studies at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. She is the coeditor (with Regina E. Spellers) of
Blackberries and Redbones: Critical Articulations of Black Hair/ Body Politics in Africana Communities.
Catherine R. Squires is John and Elizabeth Bates Cowles Professor of Journalism, Diversity, and Equality at the University of Minnesota. She is the author of
Dispatches from the Color Line: The Press and Multiracial America, also published by SUNY Press, and
African Americans and the Media.