Affective Rhetorics

Illuminates how power circulates through affective networks and digital infrastructures

In March 2013, nineteen-year-old Tunisian citizen Amina Sboui posted photographs on social media—topless with feminist slogans written on her chest—in response to policies curtailing women's rights. Her post sparked a series of events that would become the subject of news articles, blogs, and social media posts around the globe. As the images and commentary circulated, so too did bodily rhetorics.

In Affective Rhetorics Jessica L. Ouellette uses this movement to explore how affect, that is, bodily associations, reactions, and orientations, drives digital discourse and reshapes our social and bodily relations online. Using the tools of transnational feminist rhetoric, Ouellette investigates the affective economies that underpin the circulation of rhetoric and power across digital platforms, revealing how feeling operates as both fuel and currency. By identifying the affective energies that sustain or disrupt online movements, she offers a framework for understanding and transforming the rhetorical currents that shape contemporary digital life.