The Rhetorics of Crisis and Apocalypse in the Intermountain West

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Washington, 2021The following dissertation contributes to a growing interest in the field of rhetorical studies in the rhetoric(s) of crisis, specifically focused on climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the rise of white supremacist militias across the United States. This study also seeks to fill a lack of research concerning more rural publics outside of city centers in the United States—where access to higher education and opportunities for academic research are limited—as well as what kinds of activism and public engagement are possible within these places, which have become increasingly vulnerable the public crises list above. I argue that it is imperative for rhetorical scholars to understand how environmental or public health activism/advocacy in rural areas will meet some resistance (either apathy, skepticism, or outright hostility) from more conservative, religious, and extremist publics in those locales. These impasses between these opposing groups present a unique challenge for communication across difference because they frequently exhibit and employ different conventions of apocalyptic rhetoric(s) when addressing a larger crisis such as the global pandemic and climate change. Scholars like Paul Lynch, Richard Miller, Marilynn Cooper, and Lynn Worsham have already alluded to an “apocalyptic turn” in composition studies, in which discourses surrounding the larger societal crises as well as the decline and potential end of human civilization have become more commonplace in our disciplinary conversations. In this same vein, I argue that we should begin to identity, call for, and theorize a new “apocalyptic turn” in rhetorical studies. As a broader contribution to the field of English studies, I will attempt to theorize how we, as an academic discipline, should address larger “apocalyptic” crises outside of academia or re-consider the ethics and practices of teaching, researching, and writing during times of disruption and uncertainty. To conduct this study, I will take a multifaceted approach by primarily drawing from my background growing up in the LDS (or Mormon) Church in the Intermountain West, a region of the country with a long history of precarity, apocalypticism, and other environmental and public health crises. I will employ various theories of rhetoric—primarily the rhetorics of crisis, precarity, communication across difference, agency, narrative, circulation, affect, rhetorical ecologies, and rhetorical genre theory—to untangle some of the impasses of competing rhetorics in the Intermountain West and discover grounds for intervention with an eye toward action that promotes public welfare, climate justice, and ecological sustainability. In my first chapter, I will examine how apocalypticism has shaped the scientific discourses surrounding the climate crisis. Building off of this foundation, my second chapter will analyze how the historical apocalyptic rhetorics from the Mormon faith tradition have circulated and helped create foster a widespread sub-culture of anti-government activism across the Intermountain West. In my third and final chapter, I will draw from the findings of previous chapters and use theories of digital rhetoric and circulation studies to analyze how the infamous Mormon apocalyptist Ammon Bundy organized and led protests against government-mandated restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic, leading up to his organization’s involvement with the U.S. Capitol riot in early 2021. For my conclusion, I will discuss my findings from my case studies listed above to provide some final arguments about how rhetorical scholars should re-envision contemporary theories about precarious rhetorics, rhetorics of crisis, or apocalyptic rhetorics in this historical moment