Elizabeth J. Natalle - Böcker

This unique rhetorical analysis of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s communication uncovers five forms of soft diplomacy that catapult her to the top of all American first ladies as a model of international influence. Her use of interpersonal, fashion, language, cultural, and state diplomatic strategies constitutes an architectural plan of smart power. Breaking away from the stereotype of Mrs. Kennedy as a style icon, the evidence in this monograph supports her astute awareness of how to support the Kennedy Administration’s foreign policy during the Cold War era by engaging state visits to Europe and South America, receiving heads of state at the White House, creating cultural ideals of freedom through art and preservation, and using French and Spanish to speak directly to the people of other countries. Her persuasive tactics set the stage for future first ladies to excel in a role that requires creativity and sound judgment. Students in communication, political science, history, rhetoric, and women’s studies will benefit from this book in their own study of first ladies, the presidency, foreign policy, and Cold War history. Written in an engaging style, Jacqueline Kennedy and the Architecture of First Lady Diplomacy will appeal to a range of scholarly interests across disciplines.

Michelle Obama: First Lady, American Rhetor is an edited anthology that explores the persona and speech-making of the country’s first African American first lady. The result of these thought-provoking essays is an interdisciplinary text that explores the First Lady from a rhetorical and cultural point of view. Authors analyze her Democratic National Convention speeches, her brand as First Lady, her communication from her latest trip to Africa, her agenda rhetoric in Let’s Move! and Reach Higher, and her coming out as a Black feminist intellectual when she spoke at Maya Angelou’s memorial service. Readers will recognize Michelle Obama as a rhetor of our times—a woman who influences America at the intersections of gender, race, and class and who is representative of what women are today.