The rhetoric of revenge : atrocity and identity in the revolutionary Carolinas
- WCU Author/Contributor (non-WCU co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
- Benjamin H. Rubin (Creator)
- Institution
- Western Carolina University (WCU )
- Web Site: http://library.wcu.edu/
- Advisor
- Hunt Boulware
Abstract: "The Rhetoric of Revenge" addresses the way that individual acts of brutality during the
War for Independence in North and South Carolina were perceived and interpreted by
both Whig and Tory participants. This thesis looks at the processes of identity formation
and contextualization, whereby individuals took the facts as they knew them and tried to
make sense of both their own and their opponents’ place in the unfolding drama. It also
examines the ways these events were incorporated into the rhetoric of each side and were
used as tools in creating narratives of heroism on one side and brutality on the other.
Through analysis of opposing accounts of the same event, this work is able to break
through the facts of these events to understand the way individuals understood them. It is
more interested in perception than reality, and in the choices that were made regarding
the inclusion, exclusion, interpretation and exaggeration of individual factual elements.
This work also use the journals of two young men, Thomas Young, a Whig, and Anthony
Allaire, a Tory, throughout, as a common thread to tie together the many disparate and
chaotic events that became a part of conflicting identities and ultimately created two
opposing narratives of the events of the American Revolution, based on atrocity.
The rhetoric of revenge : atrocity and identity in the revolutionary Carolinas
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Created on 6/1/2010
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Additional Information
- Publication
- Thesis
- Language: English
- Date: 2010
- Keywords
- american revolution, atrocity, identity, narrative, perspective, south
- Subjects
- Allaire, Anthony, 1755-1838
- Young, Thomas, 1764-1848
- Memory -- Social aspects -- North Carolina -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783
- Memory -- Social aspects -- South Carolina -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783
- North Carolina -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783
- South Carolina -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783