Imagine that it is the 1980s and your home country of Guatemala is in the midst of a horrifying civil war. The fighting is devastating and the soldiers are committing unfathomable acts of violence on civilians—especially your country’s women. Rape, assault, and theft have all become an unfortunate part of everyday life. But one woman is willing to tell your story—the story of you, of herself, and of an entire group of indigenous people. Rhetoric is often used as a tool for political and civil discourse, but Rigoberta Menchú utilizes rhetoric as a tool to establish an identity for her people and as a way to mobilize them, calling to action a group of people that must protect this identity—we call this the rhetoric of activism. Menchú tells the story of political and civil strife in a variety of highly effective ways. Particularly in her written work I, Rigoberta Menchú, which consists of a testimony of war. Her testimony tells others her story and changes the way readers and onlookers view her culture from the outside looking in by informing them of a situation they do not have the opportunity to see firsthand. In addition to her written rhetoric, Menchú exhibited her rhetorical abilities through spoken discourse in political rallies and campaigns, and in a number of less obvious ways apparent later in this work. The publicizing of the hardships of the indigenous Guatemalan people creates a shift in the way that the community and group view itself as a whole, and consequently mobilizes the entire community to act. Menchú’s rhetoric, apparent in a variety of forms, is incredibly influential in a larger civil and political discourse. While simultaneously resonating with her fellow citizens in an important way, Menchú has affected the entire world with her stories, her testimonies, her activism, and her greater call to action, through her use of the rhetoric of activism.
Rigoberta Menchú is an indigenous Guatemalan social activist who serves a multitude of roles. Born to a financially-challenged Indian family in Guatemala in 1959, Menchú faced a lifetime of hardship at a very young age. Menchú’s mother, father, and brother were kidnapped, tortured and murdered by members of the Guatemalan military. In response to these atrocities, her sisters joined guerilla groups, while Menchú began organizing and speaking on behalf of her country’s indigenous people.
In the 1980s, Menchú began to speak out and publicize the rights of the indigenous people who were caught in the throes of the Guatemalan Civil War, which spanned from 1960 to 1996. This 36-year war was fought between the government of Guatemala and the indigenous groups living there—particularly the Mayan people, of which Menchú belongs. As a result of this horrific war, more than 200,000 people were killed and injured. It is reported that about 83% of those 200,000 were Mayans (Miller). The war began after a series of uncomfortable moments in Guatemalan history. In 1960, the country was governed by General Miguel Ydigoras Fuentes, but his authority was becoming increasingly autocratic. In response, a number of “left-wing guerilla groups” began attacking government military forces (Miller). With this, the Guatemalan Civil War ensued, until 1996 when it was ended by the signing of Peace Accords. “The legacy of brutality left by decades of civil war [has been] referenced as a major contributor to both the abuse and murder of women in Guatemala and the general attitude of impunity with which many violent crimes are committed in Guatemala” (Miller). The widespread oppression of the indigenous Mayan people and the violence inflicted on Guatemalan women urged Menchú to begin drawing attention the story of this group of marginalized people.
Menchú told stories of horrific fighting, death, rape, etc. and worked tirelessly to bring attention to the injustices being committed on her people, in particular the sexually violent acts committed against the indigenous Guatemalan women. Menchú tells of the villages where “hundreds of women, young girls, [and] widows [were] pregnant because the soldiers had used them sexually” (Menchú 141). Menchú goes on to describe how one can be killed at any time, but despite these overwhelming horrors, Menchú feels that “happiness belongs to everyone, but that happiness has been stolen by a few” and that is what motivates her to do the work that she does, her personal calling. “I had to go and teach others,” she said (141). In this excerpt from one of Menchú’s written works, we see Menchú explicitly stating her rhetorical exigence and describing her need for social action and advocacy that will lead to the eventual mobilization of an entire nationality of people.
To gain an understanding of what is meant by social action, we look to scholar Marc Pilisuk who writes that “social action is grassroots based, oriented more toward conflict than to consensus, focused upon direct action, and aimed at organizing a disadvantaged or aggrieved people to take action on their own behalf” (Pilisuk 16). At its core, this definition of social action embodies the rhetoric of activism.
The rhetoric of activism is made up of the rhetorical meanings and functions of “social protest, change, and movements [and] at the center of such discourse is an exigency for change” (Sowards 57). The rhetoric surrounding activism is complex and multifaceted and “requires organized, collective action” on behalf of the entire group striving for a change (58). The rhetoric of activism functions to create a central leadership that utilizes a number of strategies to build a common identity within a group of people (58). In the specific case of the indigenous Guatemalans under study here, Menchú recognized the need for a common identity in order to resist the horrors of a devastating civil war and ultimately to counteract them. Once organized around a centralized identity, Menchú saw the opportunity for change among this group of people through a variety of social actions. These actions allowed Menchú to present the problem to her people in a way that situated it as a clear and present danger, called for them to collaborate as one collective group, and finally to mobilize and act as a group to change the present circumstances.
Rigoberta Menchú’s most notable act of social organization and rallying was the creation of her political party Encuentro por Guatemala. This political party allowed Menchú to reach the indigenous Guatemalan people in a variety of ways. To fully understand the magnitude of Menchú’s work, we must first analyze the very name of the political party. “Encuentro por Guatemala” translates to “Together for Guatemala.” Menchú deliberately named the group in a way that would stress the need for unity among its members. “Encuentro” can also be translated specifically as “union,” furthering Menchú’s call for collaboration and unification. Furthermore, the symbol for the party consists of four green circles connected to one another by one larger red one. This is said to stand for the four groups of people that make up the Guatemalan nationality. These are the Mayas, Garifunas, Xincas, and the Ladinos (Encuentro Por Guatemala). Although not traditional spoken rhetoric, the naming of the political party and the thought behind the creation of the political logo used as the face of the organization are both incredibly important unspoken rhetorical strategies employed by Menchú. Both of these examples aid in furthering the message of unity and change that the political party itself stands for in its goal to further its message of indigenous activism.
Encuentro por Guatemala presents the problems the Guatemalan people continue to face almost 20 years after the end of the Civil War through a variety of events. These events include meetings, rallies, speeches, etc. Menchú’s political party now has a website, another important way of furthering her message. Headings on the party’s website allow members to quickly navigate between a variety of “hot topics” and issues of concern. The stories presented on the website allow the member to become personally situated within an issue. In a digital world, Menchú ‘s website acts as an important piece of rhetoric in the sense that it easily allows large audiences to become informed on issues that face the indigenous Guatemalan people. After working to align members, who have recently been advised on the ways to see themselves within the collective group, with the issues they’re fighting for, Menchú calls the group to action. This call for action is explicitly stated in Encuentro Por Guatemala’s “Who We Are” section.
In studying the “Who We Are” section of the party’s website, one can see Menchú stating that her political party believes in “an inclusive country, [seeking] profound changes in the political system” while fighting the “scourge of corruption and impunity” in the mission statement (“Nosotros”). Inspired by the rhetoric of activism strategies employed by Menchú in the wake of her country’s civil war, the political party as a whole was a logical next step in her fight to unite and motivate her people for change. The internet presence of Menchú’s party allows her message to reach greater numbers of people in a more personal way. Visitors to the website can connect on their own time in the comfort and privacy of their own locations. Overall, this is an incredibly important rhetorical strategy in both its efficiency and ease of use.
After working with her people to identify a number of certain issues, civil and financial in nature, whether face-to-face in a street in a Guatemalan rally or by way of her political party’s website mission statement, Menchú finally comes to the most important part of the rhetoric of activism—the mobilization of an informed group of people. For example, with the backing of her political party, Menchú ran for president of Guatemala in the 2007 presidential election. Menchú demonstrated her abilities as a rhetor in this run in a variety of ways. In addition to the website’s coverage of the issues and campaign trail, campaigning consisted of a number of speeches, rallies, and various campaign events, all of which called for the demonstration of Menchú’s oratory rhetorical abilities.
Menchú gave a number of speeches, (many of which were given in a foreign language in a rural area of Guatemala to indigenous people and are not well-documented), in an attempt to mobilize her party and recruit new members to follow her and fight for her beliefs in a new political system and government. Although Menchú ultimately lost the presidential election, earning only 3% of the total votes, she exhibited a number of important activist rhetorics. For example, Menchú actively protested labor and human rights violations and abuses long before the campaign itself—from the time that she was in her early twenties (“Rigoberta Menchú Tum – Guatemala, 1992.”). Her protests allowed her to speak to groups of indigenous people who understood and empathized with the oppression they faced on a daily basis. The speeches given at these protests were the foundation of Menchú’s rhetoric of activism. She used them as a way to inform others in her country and eventually as a call-to-action and mobilization tactic.
Armed with an in-depth understanding of Menchú’s exigence, tactics, and outcome of some political endeavors, we now must focus on why these aspects are important. Why Menchú? And why is she worth including in our larger context of the history of rhetoric and the feminist history of rhetoric? First, it is important to consider the very cause Menchú fought for. Menchú aimed to use rhetoric to shed light on a number of horrific issues that were affecting the lives of an indigenous group of marginalized people and to spread awareness of the military soldiers conducting those acts. The rhetoric of activism, consisting of not only making people aware of the issues at hand, but also focused on mobilizing a group of people to act, is an important category of rhetoric we cannot ignore in our larger studies of the discipline. As we know, rhetoric is used for a variety of purposes, and by including activism in that larger category, we further our understanding exponentially.
On this note, Menchú’s rhetoric of activism is also largely concerned with feminist views and the feminist history of rhetoric. Menchú’s rhetoric of activism began as a way for her to tell the story of women who were facing sexual violence during the Guatemalan Civil War at the hands of the Guatemalan military’s soldiers. She tells of the women’s hardship, brings awareness to it, and calls for something to be done, but she does not stop at only the women. The larger context of the indigenous Mayan descendants that were the focus of Menchú’s rhetoric of activism helps us to understand the larger civil context. Without Menchú’s rhetoric, students and scholars alike would be denied the opportunity to learn about the minority group. Feminism is concerned with equal treatment for women and the non-majority and that is the very group that Menchú has dedicated her life fighting and raising awareness for. Without the inclusion of Rigoberat Menchú, we, as students of Feminist History of Rhetoric, would be denied the alternate view of an entire group of people and their fight for the civil liberties enjoyed by the majority in Guatemala. As students attempting to understand a viewpoint other than the mainstream majority, we would be denying ourselves an invaluable opportunity if we did not study a Nobel Peace Prize-winning figure like Rigoberta Menchú. Not only did Menchú exhibit her rhetorical abilities through spoken discourse in political rallies and campaigns, but she also did so in a variety of other strategic ways as we have seen. The publicizing of the hardships of the indigenous Guatemalan people created a shift in the way that the community viewed itself and ultimately mobilized an entire group of people to act, form a political party, and attempt to take power as the president of Guatemala. Not only has Menchú been influential in a larger political discourse, but in a civil one as well. While resonating with other indigenous people such as herself, Menchú has affected the entire world with her testimonies, her speeches, and has ultimately organized and mobilized an entire nation through the rhetoric of activism.
Works Cited
“Nosotros.” Encuentro Por Guatemala. Encuentro Por Guatemala, 2015. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.
“Rigoberta Menchú Tum – Guatemala, 1992.” Nobel Women’s Initiative. Nobel Women’s Initiative. n.d. Web. 27 Nov. 2015.
Encuentro Por Guatemala. Encuentro Por Guatemala, n.d. Web. 16 Nov. 2015. <http://encuentro.gt/>.
Menchú, Rigoberta. I, Rigoberta Menchú. Trans. Elisabeth Burgos. New York: Verso, 1984. Print.
Miller, Talea. “Timeline: Guatemala’s Brutal Civil War.” PBS: Public Broadcasting Station. NewHour Productions LLC., 7 Marc. 2011. Web. 24 Nov. 2015.
Pilisuk, Marc. JoAnn McAllister, and Jack Rothman. “Coming Together for Action: The Challenge of Contemporary Grassroots Community Organizing.” Journal of Social Issues 52.1 (1996): 15-37. Web. 9 Nov. 2015.
Sowards, Stacy K., and Valerie R. Renegar. “Reconceptualizing Rhetorical Activism in Contemporary Feminist Contexts.” The Howard Journal of Communications (2006): 57-74. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.
UT English Lit Major 