Beyond Margins: Reflections on Race, Epistemology, and Possibility in Rhetorical Studies

In our journals, at our conferences, across various forms of media, we spend a great deal of time talking, thinking, theorizing future directions as we sit on what feels like an apocalyptic cliff. An undercurrent in these discussions is a sense that the end is inevitable, even preordained. This presumptive exercise is not wholly unexpected when our discussion builds from a Western epistemology built on a foundation of annihilation. Yet, even as the colonial project marches toward its inevitable disastrous result, we center it. As we theorize what possibilities lie at the end, we often premise the possible as achievable only after the end. Unstated is that we're still centering a system of oppression, waiting for its downfall, to begin anew. In this article, I build from this premise to reflect on race, epistemology, and possibility in rhetorical studies. I begin by outlining how I first came to see the disciplinary limitations of studying race in rhetorical studies. From here, I briefly discuss significant Chicana feminist rhetoric scholars who helped guide me toward my current perspective. I then move to a discussion of how I currently conceptualize the relationship between race and epistemology, highlighting structural issues that prevent us from embracing a critical shift toward a theory of resistance in the study of race. From there, I conclude with my hope for future study, amplifying the call in this journal to imagine other possibilities outside of the limitations of a Western construct of race. Now. Before the end.