Rhetoric scholars have articulated diverse approaches to both civil and human rights as political, ethical, and academic discourses. "Traditions of Testifying and Witnessing" initiates important interdisciplinary conversations within human rights rhetoric concerning the construction of rights knowledge, the role of advocacy, and politics of representations during acts of witnessing. Developing a conceptual framework for rhetorical inquiry into rights discourse, the collection of essays by established scholars demonstrates a range of approaches and subject matter. From textual analysis of AIDS politics and activism to theoretical discussions of the nature of rights rhetoric and confession, the book challenges many current assumptions about rights history and practices and still provides an introduction to the recent themes for classroom use. To encourage critical reflection on the assumptions, contentions, and implications of political representations and human rights, the editors have concluded the collection with a series of suggestive visualworks without comment to prompt viewers' own engagement with them.This book was originally published as a special issue of Rhetoric Society Quarterly

1. Human Rights Rhetoric: Traditions of Testifying and Witnessing Arabella Lyon and Lester C. Olson 2. Human Rights and Civil Rights: The Advocacy and Activism of African-American Women Writers Jacqueline Jones Royster & Molly Cochran 3. ''From the Eye to the Soul'': Industrial Labor's Mary Harris ''Mother'' Jones and the Rhetorics of Display Mari Boor Tonn 4. Rights Language and HIV Treatment: Universal Care or Population Control? Cindy Patton 5. A Question of Confession's Discovery Erik Doxtader 6. Human Rights Rhetoric of Recognition Wendy S. Hesford 7. A Visual Sequence: Human Rights Rhetoric Lester C. Olson and Arabella Lyon