13

Nommo, Kawaida, and Communicative Practice

Bringing Good Into the World

Maulana Karenga

In this chapter, Mualana Karenga explores ancient and ongoing African traditions of communicative practice in understanding African American rhetoric. For Karenga, African rhetoric is essentially the communicative practice that is oriented to building community and bringing good into the world, which is in stark contrast to the utilitarian inclination of contemporary Western rhetoric that accentuates persuasiveness without sufficient consideration of the ethical dimension. From a Kawaida vantage point, he argues that African rhetoric is a rhetoric of community, resistance, reaffirmation, and possibility. Karenga then discusses the reaffirmative, communal, and emancipative characteristics of African American rhetoric in the work of Molefi Kete Asante through an appreciation of the creative power of nommo. In what follows, he explicates the concept of mdw nfr or medu nefer (good speech), which means “morally good” and “aesthetically beautiful.” In a nutshell, his theoretical exploration shows that African rhetoric is a rhetoric of ethics that emphasizes and respects the dignity and rights of the human person, the well-being and flourishing of community, the integrity and value of the environment, and the reciprocal solidarity and cooperation of humanity. Miike (Chapter 8), Mowlana (Chapter 15), Chang (Chapter 17), Dissanayaka (Chapter 30), and Tu (Chapter 32) in this volume also demonstrate that Asian traditional cultures and communities also place a high priority on the ethical aspect of communication just like the case of African and African-American rhetoric.

Scope and Framework

The central project of this essay is to make a useful contribution to the ancient and ongoing conversation around the definition, field, and function of African communicative practice, using classical African sources, principally ancient Egyptian (Kemetic) texts, as a fundamental point of departure and framework for understanding and engaging African American rhetoric. It contains an implicit critique and corrective for the dominant consumerist conception of a rhetoric pressed into the service of vulgar persuasion, advertisement, seduction, and sales. It assumes that not only has the dominant European paradigm abandoned the classical Aristotelian understanding of rhetoric as deliberation and action in the interest of the polis, but also that it is not informed by the possibilities inherent in the rich resources of multicultural contributions to this field (Logan 1999; Asante 1998; Hauser 1998). I will begin with a discussion of tradition and themes in African American rhetorical practice and then continue with a critical engagement of the conceptual construct nommo, its evolution in the 1960s as a central category in Black rhetorical studies, and its usefulness in providing conceptual space not only for African-centered grounding in the field of rhetoric but also for exploring alternative ways of understanding and approaching communicative practice (Hamlet 1998; Niles 1995; Walker 1992).

With in this framework, the communal character of communicative practice is reaffirmed and rhetoric is approached as, above all, a rhetoric of communal deliberation, discourse, and action, oriented toward that which is good for the community and world. And it is here that communicative practice is posed as both expressive and constitutive of community, a process and a practice of building community and bringing good into the world. This understanding brings into focus and complements the ethical teaching of the Odu Ifa 78: 1, the sacred text of ancient Yorubaland, that “humans are divinely chosen to bring good into the world” and that this is the fundamental mission and meaning in human life (Karenga 1999a, 228).

I will also examine the ancient Egyptian concept of mdw nfr, eloquent and effective speech, delineating its socioethical concerns and retrieving and articulating these concerns as an essential component of the conception and pursuit of the central interests of this project. It should be understood that my intention here is not to construct a causal relationship between ancient Egyptian and African American rhetorical practice. Rather, it is to identify shared insights and orientations in a larger African tradition of communicative practice and to recover and employ these classical African understandings to expand the range of useful concepts in defining and explicating communicative practice in general and the African American rhetorical project in particular. This approach parallels the use of classical Greek rhetorical insights by European scholars to develop and explicate theories of rhetoric and its practice by various European cultures with out needing to show causal links of rhetorical practice between ancient Greece and, let us say, Vikings or Victorian England. Framing the discussion within Kawaida philosophy, I will then consolidate the multiple ranges of meanings of African communicative practice into four enduring socioethical concerns and use this conceptual construct to demonstrate coherence and continuity in the African communicative practice tradition, from ancient origins to modern ethical engagement with the critical issues of our times. These enduring socioethical concerns are the dignity and rights of the human person, the well-being and flourishing of family and community, the integrity and value of the environment, and the reciprocal solidarity and cooperation for mutual benefit of humanity.

Again, the approach to this project is essentially an Afrocentric cultural approach rooted in Kawaida philosophy, which defines itself as an ongoing synthesis of the best of African thought and practice in constant exchange with the world and is directed toward the enduring historical project of maximum human freedom and human flourishing times (Karenga 1997a, 1997b, 1980). It poses culture as a unique and instructive way of being human in the world and a fundamental framework for self-understanding and self-assertion in it. Kawaida also maintains that as persons in general and intellectuals in particular, we must constantly dialog with African culture, asking it questions and seeking from it answers to the fundamental and enduring concerns of humankind. This dialog with African culture requires that one ask at every critical juncture of research, writing, and discourse the crucial question of what Africa (i.e., African people and African culture) has to offer in efforts toward understanding human thought and practice, improving the human condition, and enhancing the human prospect. Moreover, to dialog with African culture is to constantly engage its texts, continental and diasporan, ancient and modern. This will include engaging its oral, written, and living-practice texts, its paradigms, its worldview and values, and its understanding of itself and the world in an ongoing search for ever better answers to the fundamental, enduring, and current questions and challenges of our lives.

Tradition and Themes

To engage in rhetoric as an African is to enter an ancient and ongoing tradition of communicative practice, a practice that reaffirms not only the creative power of the word but also rootedness in a world historical community and culture, which provides the foundation and framework for self-understanding and self-assertion in the world (Asante 1998; Karenga 1997b; Obenga 1990). It is a tradition that from its inception has been concerned with building community, reaffirming human dignity, and enhancing the life of the people. It has expanded in more recent times to include vital contributions to the struggles for liberation in the political, economic, and cultural senses as a rhetoric of resistance. Thus, where as Herbert Simons (1978, 50) talks of “distinctive and recurring patterns of rhetorical practice” as defining a genre, I want to identify these defining patterns of African rhetorical practice and locate them into the larger context of a distinct and ongoing tradition. By tradition I mean, within the framework of Kawaida philosophy, a cultural core that forms the central locus of our self-understanding and self-assertion in the world and which is mediated by constantly changing historical circumstances and an ongoing internal dialog of reassessment and continuous development (Karenga 2002, 1997a, 1995, 1980).

Here tradition is not simply an obvious source of authority, but also in the Asantean sense the source of location, “the constantly presenting and re-presenting context, the evolving presentation context, the perspective—that is history to us” (Asante 1990, 5–6). It is, he says, the source of “codes, paradigms, symbols, motifs, myths and circles of discussion that reinforce the centrality of African ideals as a valid frame of reference for acquiring and examining data.” Again, then, this corresponds to the Kawaida concept of tradition as a core source out of which the materials, methods, and methodologies of rhetoric and other communicative practices are made. And as part of the larger cultural context, it becomes an essential source of our self-understanding and self-assertion in the world (Karenga 1997a). It is a tradition that incorporates unity and diversity, consensus and disagreement, affirmation and opposition, criticism and corrective, and a critical integration of the past with the understanding and engagement of the present and the aspirations and strivings for the future.

As an expression and constitutive process of community, African rhetoric is first of all a rhetoric of community. In other words, it evolves in ancient African culture as a rhetoric of communal deliberation, discourse, and action, directed toward bringing good into the community and the world (Karenga 1999a, 1994; Asante 1998; Parkinson 1991; Assmann 1990; Gyekye 1987; Perry 1986). In the context of historical and current oppression, African rhetoric is also a rhetoric of resistance. Clearly, given a community forcibly transferred to America during the holocaust of enslavement and systematically oppressed since then, a central aspect of the corpus of African American rhetorical practice is rooted in and reflective of constant resistance (Logan 1999; Hamlet 1998; Niles 1995; Walker 1992; Howard-Pitney 1990; Smith 1972; Foner 1972; Bosmajian and Bosmajian 1969; Woodson 1925; Dunbar 1914). Thus, some of African America’s greatest addresses and messages are, like the people themselves, conceived and forged in the crucible of struggle (see Glenn 1986 for an extensive bibliography).

In these same texts and others, one finds that African American rhetoric is also a rhetoric of reaffirmation. It is self-consciously committed to the reaffirmation of the status of the African person and African people as bearers of dignity and divinity, of their right to a free, full, and meaningful life, and of their right and responsibility to speak their own special cultural truth to the world and make their own unique contribution to the forward flow of human history (Karenga 1980). But in reaffirming their own human rights and social and world-historical responsibilities to bring good into the world, at the same time they frame the discourse in such a way that the claim is on behalf of and in the interest of all people, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized (Karenga 1999b, 1984). This is the meaning of Asante’s statement concerning the central themes and intentionality of Black speakers: “In a real sense their speeches document the search by all men for the basic and fundamental rights of dignity, respect and equality.” And he concludes that “because they record the speaker’s response to the living issues of justice and freedom, these addresses are part of America’s greatest heritage” (Smith 1971, vii). Finally, African rhetorical practice is a rhetoric of possibility. It seeks not simply to persuade, but to share, to inform, to question, and to search for and explore possibilities in the social and human condition. And it is in this regard that it is an active call to counsel and collaboration in the ongoing quest for effective ways to solve human problems, elevate the human spirit, reaffirm the right, create expanding space for maximum human freedom and human flourishing, and constantly bring good into the world.

Nommo and the Reaffirmation of the 1960s: Sociohistorical Setting

As I have noted elsewhere, “the Reaffirmation of the ’60s stands, after the classical period and the Holocaust of enslavement, as one of the modal periods of African history” (Karenga 2002, 183–84). By modal periods I mean periods that define the conception and practice of Black life in profound and enduring ways and speak to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense. The classical period in the Nile Valley reflects the African commitment to knowledge, ethical, and spiritual grounding and cultural excellence, introducing and developing some of the basic disciplines of human knowledge and contributing to the forward flow of human history. It is here that the oldest texts on rhetoric as well as other disciplines are found (Freeman 1997; El Nadoury 1990; Diop 1987, 1991; Harris 1971).

The holocaust of enslavement tested and tempered African people; it called forth and demonstrated their adaptive vitality, human durability, and internal capacity to persevere and prevail. And it also reinforced their commitment to human freedom and human dignity in profound and active ways of struggle, of resistance, and of holding on to their humanity in the most inhuman conditions. The modal period of the 1960s was above all a reaffirmation—a reaffirmation of our Africanness and social justice tradition, which had at it score a flowering of creativity and struggle, rhetoric, remembrance and resistance (Woodard 1999; Conyers 1997; Van Deburg 1993; Williams 1987; Pinkney 1976; Brisbane 1974). It is in the 1960s, a decade of storm, steadfastness, and struggle, that African Americans not only reaffirmed their identity and dignity as an African people, but compelled U.S. society and its academies to recognize and respect this most ancient of human cultures and civilizations and to teach them in the universities in newly established departments, programs and centers. And it is in this decade that we struggled to return to our own history, speak our own special cultural truth to the world, and self-consciously make our own unique contribution to how this country is reconceived and reconstructed.

Likewise, African Americans reaffirmed our commitment to our social justice tradition, a social justice tradition that is the oldest in the world, reaching back to the ethical teachings of ancient Egypt (Kemet) and continuing in the teaching of the Odu Ifa of Yorubaland, through the holocaust of enslavement and post-holocaust segregation to the 1960s (Karenga 1999a, 1994; Wilmore 1998; Fulop and Raboteau 1996; Hayes 1996). As I (Karenga 1995, 2) noted elsewhere, it is a tradition that requires at a minimum “respect for the dignity and rights of the human person, economic justice, meaningful political participation, shared power, cultural integrity, mutual respect for all peoples, and uncompromising resistance to social forces and structures which deny or limit these.” Indeed, the reaffirmation of our Africanness and social justice tradition permeates Black rhetoric of the period and points toward a profound change in the way African Americans understood and asserted themselves in society and the world (Golden and Rieke 1971; Smith and Robb 1971; Smith, 1972, 1970, 1969; Smitherman 1977; Williams and Williams 1970; Boulware 1969; Hill 1964).

Nommo, the Creative Word

The category of nommo evolved in the 1960s not only as a conceptual framework for understanding and engaging in African American rhetorical practice, but also for communicative practice in the broadest sense of the word. It reflects the efforts to recover and reconstruct African culture and to use the past as a foundation and framework for present and future projects. The word nommo or nummo was taken from the creation narrative of the Dogon people of Mali (Griaule and Dieterlen 1986; Griaule 1965). According to the Dogon sage Ogotommêli, the Creator, Amma, sends nommo, the word (in the collective sense of speech), to complete the spiritual and material reorganization of the world and to assist humans in the forward movement in history and society. It is through the word, Ogotommêli tells us, that weaving, forging, cultivating, building family and community, and making the world good are made possible. Inherent in the concept of nommo are the triple aspects and elements of water, wind, and word, symbolizing, respectively, the life force (animation), life essence (spirit), and life creation (creativity). Moreover, nommo is “the completion of the perfect series [of creation], symbol of the total union of male and female, that is to say of unity” (Griaule 1965, 26). It is this sacred, indispensable, and creative character of the word, as an inherent and instrumental power to call into being, to mold, to bear infinite meanings, and to forge a world we all want and deserve to live in, that seizes the hearts and minds of the African American creative community and becomes a fundamental framework for developing, doing, and understanding rhetorical practice—both its oral and literary forms.

The Asantean Initiative

It is Molefi Kete Asante who introduced the category of nommo into rhetorical discourse and criticism in his joint work with Stephen Robb (Smith and Robb 1971). Although this is a collaborative work in terms of speech selection and editing, a careful reading of Asante’s work as well as the similarity of the text in this and his Afrocentric Idea (1998) show a distinctive theoretical development and conceptual continuity that is unquestionably Asante’s. In this earlier work, then, Asante begins to explore concepts that ultimately lead to his development of Afrocentricity as a methodology, not only for rhetoric but for Africana studies as a whole. He notes in the introduction that “the African brought to America a fertile oral tradition, and the generating and sustaining powers of the spoken word permeated every area of his life” (Smith and Robb 1971, 1). Moreover, prohibited by law from reading and writing, “the African in America early cultivated his natural fascination with Nommo, the word, and demonstrated a singular appreciation for the subtleties, pleasures and potentials of the spoken word that has continued to enrich and embolden his history.” Moreover, Asante is interested here also in drawing a distinction between African communicative practice and European practice. He argues that “[i]t is a cardinal mistake of our society to operate on the basis that language functions of Whites are everywhere reducible in Black societies in terms of influence and ends” (Smith and Robb 1971, 2).

Asante argues that this distinctive communicative practice of African Americans is rooted in their African heritage—in its oral tradition and in its continuing embrace of the concept and practice of “transforming vocal communication” (Smith and Robb 1971, 2). From this heritage and continuing practice, “the Afro-American developed, consciously or subconsciously, a consummate skill in using language to produce his own alternative communication patterns.” Again, the concept that captures this process and practice is nommo. Thus, he contends, “to understand contemporary Black rhetoric in America means one must understand that Nommo continues to permeate Black activities.” He cautions that “[t]his is not to say all Black people or most Black people are conscious of Nommo in a technical sense, but rather that most Blacks, given the situation can immediately identify the transforming power of vocal expression.”

Finally, Asante calls attention to the fact that it is the practice of everyday life that shapes and reshapes the rhetorical practice as it puts forth and develops its transforming and constantly transformed expressions. For him, the holocaust of enslavement and its continuing effects “stand astride every meaningful rhetorical pathway like a giant colossus.” And “while the stated theme of a given speech may be White racism, Black pride, freedom, crime, poverty, desegregation, poor housing conditions and voting rights, the underlying issue is always the slavery experience” (Smith and Robb 1971, 3, 4). This insight raises questions of what this inhuman and brutal physical and cultural genocide means, how we deal with its “residual effects,” and how Black people can “regain their pre-slavery indeed pre-American heritage” (see also Asante 1998, part 2). Asante continues to develop these themes in his next book (Smith 1972), but his work takes a definitive turn in terms of his critical understanding of the rich resource of African culture and his development of Afrocentricity in the late 1970s as a methodology for understanding and engaging not only the field of rhetoric, but also the discipline of Africana studies, in which it is located (Asante 1998, 1990, 1988).

In The Afrocentric Idea, his latest work on communicative practice, Asante states, “[B]y the nature of traditional African philosophy, rhetoric in African society is an architectonic functioning art, continuously fashioning the sounds and symbols of people even as it reenacts history.” Moreover, he says that “the word is productive and imperative, calling forth and commanding.” And “because the word is imperative, it is the fundament as well as the fashioning instrument of traditional African society” (1998, 81). Here Asante reaffirms the ancient African understanding of speech as a world-creating power and process. For the ancients, this refers to creative activities in the divine, natural, and social worlds. However, my essential interest here is to privilege the creation of the social world in this project without prejudice toward or neglect of the more inclusive ancient concept of world creation. In this context, Asante argues further:

Asante’s contribution to the development of the concept of nommo was instrumental in its evolution in the 1960s as a central category in Black rhetorical studies. Nommo, as a conceptual construct that sought to recover and engage African modalities in understanding and approaching rhetorical practice, has been particularly useful in providing conceptual space not only for African-centered grounding in the field of rhetoric, but also for exploring and developing alternative ways to conceive, critique, and conduct this defining human activity. Within this framework one perceives that the communal character of communicative practice and rhetoric is engaged, above all, as a rhetoric of community, in a word, a rhetoric of communal deliberation, discourse, and action oriented toward that which is good for the community and world. And it is here also that rhetoric is most definitively understood as a communicative practice in the fullest sense, as both an expression of community and a constitutive practice of building community and bringing good into the world. What I want to do now is to explore this concept and process from a Kawaida perspective, using Kawaida philosophy and its understanding of classical African conceptions of rhetorical practice as a foundation and framework.

Kawaida and the Concept of Mdw Nfr

The assumptions and contentions about communicative practice made at the beginning of this essay are rooted in and reflective of the Kawaida retrieval and reading of the classical African sources, especially those of ancient Egypt (Kemet) (Karenga 1994, 1984). Fox has noted that although “[r]hetorical theory is traditionally thought to have originated with the Greeks,” the ancient Egyptians can claim “their rightful place in the history of rhetoric” (1983, 9). And that, of course, is a place of anteriority. For as the records show, “the rich literature of pharonic Egypt … does offer us theories of rhetoric …, that is a conceptual rhetoric of good speech … expressed both incidentally and explicitly in the context of advice about the efficacy.” Fox also rightly states that there is in ancient Egyptian texts an equivalent for the English word rhetoric (1983, 11–12). In fact, in the Book of Ptahhotep, there are two expressions for rhetoric, rhetoric as eloquent and effective speech itself (mdt nfrt—medet neferet) and rhetoric as the rules or principles of eloquent and effective speech (tp-h.sb n mdt nfrt—tep-h.eseb en medet neferet). Fox uses the latter and argues that the use of the singular form of tep-h.eseb, “principle” or “rule,” is significant, for Ptahhotep, in whose work it is used, “sees himself as presenting not just a variety of counsels about good speech, but as offering instructions that together form ‘the principle of good speech.’”

Fox concludes that given this, for the ancient Egyptians “[e]loquence is a unity.” This contention concerning the unity of the principles of eloquent and effective speech is correct and reflects the Kemetic understanding of rhetoric as a craft (ḥmwt) not simply to persuade through mastery of technique (technē), but to exchange in pursuit of the good for the community and the world. This is why the three modes of appeal identified in Aristotelian rhetoric—logos, the rational appeal; ethos, the ethical appeal; and pathos, the emotional appeal—are in Kemetic rhetoric bound together in an inseparable unity.

Indeed, the ancient Egyptians conceived of speech as essentially an ethical activity, an activity of tremendous power that could be used for good or evil. The very concept and category, medu nefer, literally means “good speech,” and nefer (good) here, like in other African languages (i.e., Swahili zuri and Zulu hle), means both “morally good” and “aesthetically beautiful.” Therefore, medu nefer, at its best, was always ethical, and it was truly worthy not because it was technically logical, but because it was appropriate and effective in the context of an ethical value system, Maat, the moral ideal in ancient Egypt. Maat is a polysemic word, but in the simplest terms it means “rightness in the world,” that is, in the divine, natural, and social realms. It is informed by seven cardinal virtues: truth, justice, propriety, harmony, balance, reciprocity, and order (Karenga 1994). And as Fox (1983, 15) notes in discussing the canons of Kemetic rhetoric, “most important and most characteristically Egyptian, is the canon of truthfulness.” Indeed, “[t]ruthful speech is effective speech because it creates your ethos and because it is in and of itself persuasive.” It is this ethical core of the project that makes it resistant to the artifice and dissimulation that are so prevalent in much of what passes as rhetoric and rhetorical instruction in a consumerist society committed to seduction and sales.

In addition to Ptahhotep’s advice on good speech, the locus classicus of eloquent and effective speech in practice is the Book of Khunanup (Parkinson 1991; Perry 1986; Karenga 1984, 29–35; Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 169–84). It is important to note that the classic work in Kemetic rhetoric is at the same time the definitive text on Maat, the moral ideal in ancient Egypt (Assmann 1990, chap. 3). The text is a narrative whose central focus is the eloquent and effective petitions for justice by Khunanup, a peasant (whom most Egyptologists call “The Eloquent Peasant”) “whose speech is truly beautiful,” that is, eloquent and effective and who has been abused by an official and seeks redress from the magistrate of the region (Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 172). The text again stresses that good speech, called here mdw nfr—medu nefer, is not the sole possession of the learned or well established. Indeed, peasants, women, servants, and all kinds of everyday people can be eloquent and effective speakers for truth and justice in the world. Given the use of medu nefer to describe Khunanup’s eloquent and effective speech, I use it as the principal term of Kemetic rhetoric rather than the alternative form medet neferet except when quoting Ptahhotep directly.

Excursus: Revisiting Aristotle

It is at this point that one can rightfully argue that the dominant European paradigm of classical rhetoric, which was based on Aristotelian and neo-Aristotelian rhetorical understanding, has been seriously compromised, if not abandoned altogether. Aristotle (1991) understood rhetoric as deliberation and action in the interest of the polis and thus valued the ethical aspect of the practice (Furley and Nehamaus 1994; Garver 1994; Beiner 1983). In fact, Aristotle notes in his Rhetoric (1354b) that in principle, arguments based on truth are presumed to be stronger than those that are not. In one case Aristotle, defining rhetoric, says that “rhetoric is a combination of the science of logic and the ethical branch of politics,” but if we try to make rhetoric what it is not, a science, we tend to destroy its true nature (1354b). As Calvin Schrag (1986, 181–82) states, rhetoric has to do with both discourse and craft or art (technē). But “the Aristotelian notion of technē should not be confused with the modern notion of ‘technique’ as an affiliate of technology.” Thus “[r]hetoric as an art is not a technique for control, an instrument for manipulation, a routine that can be mapped out in advance.”

Schrag reasons that Aristotle had anticipated this degenerative practice of rhetoric and “installed a distinction between forensics and the deliberative rhetoric of political oratory” (1986, 182–83).

Indeed, Aristotle does call attention to the existing preference for modes of oratory that win points in argument and debate, and notes that he favors deliberative discourse for the common good of the polis. Thus he says that “although the same systematic principles apply to political as to forensic oratory … the former is a nobler business and fitter for a citizen than that which concerns relations with private individuals.” And “the reason for this,” he concludes, “is that in political oratory there is less inducement to talk about non-essentials.” Moreover, “[p]olitical oratory is less given to unscrupulous practices than forensic, because it treats wider issues” (1354b). Certainly, no one with a modicum of awareness of U.S. politics and political discourse can claim they do not deal with “non-essentials” much of the time, from the sexual habits of opponents to catering to vulgar tastes of various constituencies. Likewise, Aristotle’s statement about political oratory being “less given to unscrupulous practices than forensic, because it treats wider issues” shatters on the same rock of reality, that is, the actual practices of politics in the established order of things in the United States. But one cannot help sensing that inherent in this degenerative tendency of rhetoric is Aristotle’s simplest and most often used definition of rhetoric: “the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion” (1355b). For it is this focus on persuasion by any and all available means that has become not only the defining practice of political rhetoric, but also the central focus of instruction for communication classes in the academy and other structures.

Return to the Kemetic Paradigm

As stated above, the Kemetic concept of rhetoric, medu nefer, requires a unity of the principles of rhetoric in which all three modalities of appeal form an inseparable unity and the ethical concern serves as hub and hinge on which the entire enterprise turns. This concept is essentially worked out in the genre of ancient Egyptian texts called seḅyt (sebait), which literally means “instructions,” but also is found in other texts such as the autobiographies (Karenga 1999b; Lichtheim 1988). These “books of instructions” are essentially social and political ethical texts designed for and dedicated to instructing members of ancient Egypt’s large bureaucracy in the principles of right conduct in governance (Karenga 1984, 37–71; Lichtheim 1975–80). Most of this instruction on medu nefer applies to both personal relations and the public conduct of governance. It includes advice on verbal exchange in the family, in public, at court, and in court. This reflects the ancient Egyptian commitment to a unified life—private and public—and the commitment to Maatian thought and practice in both spheres.

In discussing Kemetic rhetoric, Fox (1983, 16) lists five fundamental canons of ancient Egyptian rhetoric: silence, good timing, restraint, fluency, and truthfulness. These are obviously not exhaustive of the canons of ancient Egyptian rhetorical practice, but they are useful in highlighting some of the most important aspects. However, Fox’s category of “silence” can be collapsed into “restraint,” for the conceptual elasticity of the category gr (ger), which he uses for “silence,” allows for a more expansive meaning of “self-control,” which he himself notes (1983, 13). In fact, the paradigmatic Maatian person, the geru maa, posited in the Sebait of Amenomope (Lichtheim 1975–80, 2: 146–63) is not simply the truly silent man, as Fox indicates, but more accurately the truly self-controlled person, who, as Fox himself states, “succeeds by virtue of his unflagging inner repose and self-control.”

Classical African Rhetoric as Communal and Ethical Practice

However, I am interested not so much in canon as technique and rule as I am in rhetoric as a communicative and communal practice to build community and bring good in the community and world. Thus, I want to turn now to four overarching ethical concerns of classical African rhetoric, which, as I stated at the beginning of this essay, find resonance in African American rhetoric since its inception. These are the dignity and rights of the human person, the well-being of family and community, the integrity and value of the environment, and the reciprocal solidarity and cooperation for mutual benefit of humanity. Clearly, these rhetorical and ethical themes vary in emphasis and intensity of appeal, depending on the audience and context or ground of engagement. But they form a unity of moral and public vision and purpose, and thus are interrelated explicitly and implicitly in the classical paradigm.

The Dignity and Rights of the Human Person

The Sebait of Ptahhotep is not only the oldest complete text in the world, it is also the oldest rhetorical treatise in the world. It is written by the prime minister, Ptahhotep, as a legacy of instruction to his son and by extension to all who perform and aspire to engage in public service (Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 61–80; Simpson 1973, 159–76; Zaba 1956). Ptahhotep begins his instructions on the standard of medu nefer, good speech, by advising humbleness in learning and respect for fellow human beings whatever their status. And in this he reaffirms the ethical concern for the dignity of the human person as a fundamental aspect of rhetorical practice. He says:

This is the first instruction, thus suggesting its priority as a condition for good speech. It speaks against arrogance in the possession and use of knowledge in rhetorical practice. For the practice is above all a communal and deliberative practice directed toward the good of the community, and this requires respect for all people, regardless of knowledge level, class, or gender. For here they are posed not as an audience, but as fellow participants in the collaborative quest for the common good.

Moreover, Ptahhotep, like Aristotle after him, sees rhetoric as a craft (hmwt, hemut), a practice carried out with skill, artistry, and precision. And he demonstrates his respect for it as an art or craft by saying that it is a rare attainment. Furthermore, he says later in the text to “become a craftsman and speak to perfection” (II. 615–16). Yet he notes that medu nefer, eloquent and effective speech, can also be found among the women at the grindstone. Such a position reflects a central pillar of Maatian ethics: the equal dignity and inherent possibilities in all persons, male and female, rich and poor. It is clearly one of Africa’s most important contributions to the ethical development of humankind to have introduced the concept of humans as the images of God, senenu netcher, and thus as equal bearers of dignity and divinity, as early as 2140 B.C.E. in the Book of Kheti (Karenga 1994, 597ff; 1984, 52; Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 106).

This respect for the dignity or inherent worthiness of human beings is also reaffirmed in the narrative of Djedi, in which the sage Djedi tells Pharaoh Khufu, who is about to kill a nameless prisoner, that he must not kill or use any person for an experiment (Blackman 1988). For within the Maatian ethical tradition, “it is not permitted to do such a thing to the noble flock of God,” that is, the noble images of God, human beings (Lichtheim 1975–80, 219). This stress on the inherent worthiness and possibilities in each human being emphasizes the ancient Egyptian concept of rhetoric as essentially an ethical practice defined not only by its truth and truthfulness, but also by its respect for the masses of people who are the hearers and participants in the rhetorical and political project of creating and sustaining a just and good society, that is, a Maatian society.

Linked to this recognition of the inherent worthiness of each person and the rhetor’s audience or co-agents in collaborative discourse and action is the need for the rhetor to stand worthy heror himself. Thus, in what Fox calls the literary oratory of ancient Egypt, especially in the autobiographies, there is a rhetorical and moral claim of standing worthy before the people (Lichtheim 1988). Therefore, Nefer-sesham Ra says, “I have spoken truly, I have done justice. I spoke beautifully and repeated what was good so as to stand well with the people” (Karenga 1984, 95). Again, this respect of the audience as worthy respondents and partners in a project of common good is central to Kemetic communicative practice.

In Khunanup, one finds also the concern for the rights as well as dignity of the human person. Indeed, the petitions Khunanup makes for justice for the poor and vulnerable are inherently concerned with the dignity and rights of the human person. Thus, when he seeks justice, it is based on the concept of Maat, which reaffirms and requires equal dignity and basic human rights for all. Khunanup speaks directly to the concepts of rights three times, each time asking the magistrate, Rensi, to allow him to defend his rights. Lichtheim (1975–80, 177, 179, 180) defines these terms, sp nfr, n-wn-m-’, sp n-wn-m-’, and sp nfr, as “good cause” and” rightful cause, “and Simpson (1973, 42) uses “right cause.” But Rodriguez (2000, 364) rightly defines them as meaning “right” or “rights.” For in the sense that Khunanup is using them and in the judicial context in which he makes his petition, a right cause or rightful cause is, in fact, a just claim, which is the definition of a right in both the ethical and legal senses. Thus, Khunanup calls on Rensi to recognize and respect his just claim or right, not simply as an Egyptian citizen, but more importantly as a person whose ground is not the state, but that which transcends and grounds the good society, Maat. In this he calls for a cooperative and collaborative practice called “returning Maat to its place,” that is, as the framework and foundation of political, judicial, and social practice.

Moreover, the call for collaborative discourse by Ptahhotep speaks to the intentionality of rhetorical practice in the context of what we now call politics and the ancient Egyptians called governance. Although there are various words for governance—hekat, sekher, seshemet—I want to use seshemet here. For it not only suggests “leadership,” “guidance,” and “showing the way,” but also “working out” and “proving,” as in a problem of math (Faulkner 1991, 247). Indeed, the collaborative deliberation of public discourse suggests the need to “work out” the problems and possibilities of society and the world. It is this conceptual framework of collaborative discourse and action that enables us to understand the Kemetic concepts of politics or governance as a collective vocation to create and sustain a just society and good world. And the rhetorician, rhetor or speaker, is charged with eliciting collaborative discourse and action through directedness to the other as interlocutor and co-agent in this awesome collective vocation. Thus, given the intentionality of the rhetorical practice and process, the centrality of the ethical becomes obvious and imperative.

The Well-Being and Flourishing of Community

As the reaffirmation of the dignity of the human person is central to the Kemetic rhetorical project, so is the concern for the well-being and flourishing of community. In the autobiographies, this concern is worked out in the moral claims of having done good for family and the people (Lichtheim 1988). Therefore, Count Harkhuf says, “I have come from my city. I have descended from my district … I was one worthy, one beloved of his father, praised by his mother and one whom all his brothers and sisters loved” (Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 24). Having located himself in community and family, he then goes on to declare that he did good for the people, especially the vulnerable, saying, “I gave bread to the hungry, clothing to the naked and brought the boatless to land (Lichtheim 1975–80, 1: 24). Iti, the treasurer, says, “I am a worthy citizen who acts with his arm. I am a great pillar of the Theban district, a man of standing in the Southland” (Lichtheim 1988, 31). And finally, Lady Tahabet defines herself not only as a worthy daughter, but also as a worthy citizen. She says,

Thus, these persons are concerned with the good of family and community, and their moral self-presentation is not self-congratulatory rhetoric, but rather the presentation of a model of commitment and behavior worthy of a self-conscious member of family and community.

Asante has noted that “African rhetoric is distinguished not only in its concern for coherence and participation, but also its relationship to the stability of the traditional society” (1998, 78). Surely these eloquent autobiographical texts attest strongly to this contention. For what the texts stress is the role of communicative practice in the constitution of the social world, its eliciting and reaffirming a shared investment in creating and sustaining the just and good world we want and deserve to live in. And they also reveal how self is called into being and constituted in community and through the communicative practice it elicits and sustains, that is, a practice of discourse and action within a community. In contrast to the classical European conception of self as a thinking subject, the texts pose the classical African concept of self as a related and relating subject. Thus, it is not simply “I think, therefore I am,” but rather that I am related and relate to others, therefore I am. It is in my being-with, being-of, and being-for others that I discover and constitute myself. And it is through communicative practice within an ancient and ongoing tradition that I achieve this. As Schrag points out correctly, “the distinctive stamp of rhetorical intentionality is that it reaches out toward, aims at, is directed to the other as hearer, reader, audience” (1986, 198). He continues, “This intentionality illustrates not the theoretical reflection of cognitive detachment but rather the practical engagement of concrete involvement.” One must add, however, as Schrag has done elsewhere for his own paradigm, that in the African sense, the listening others are not simply hearers, readers, and audience, but also co-agents, co-participants, in creating and sustaining the just society and good world that point toward and make possible maximum human freedom and human flourishing.

The Integrity and Value of the Environment

The ancient Egyptian autobiographies also yield an ethical concern for the integrity and value of the environment and our obligation to preserve and protect it (Karenga 1999b, 51–53; 2002, 247–49). This principle of communicative practice evolved from the concept of Maat and its central concept of worthiness before nature. As I have noted elsewhere, “Maat requires worthiness before the Creator, nature and the people. The concept of worthiness before nature in the Maatian tradition evolves out of the understanding that moral worthiness, like existence, is interrelated in every area of life” (Karenga 2002, 247). And nature is one of the key areas of moral concern, along with the divine and social realms. As part of this order of rightness, which binds all things together, humans belong to each of these realms. “In their identity as divine images of God, they belong to the Divine; in their identity as social beings, they belong to society and in their identity as living beings, they belong to nature” (Karenga 1994, 723).

The Kemetic concept of serudj ta has particular importance here. It refers to the ethical obligation of humans to restore and repair the world with the extended meaning of making it more beautiful than it was when we inherited it. Thus, it speaks to the ancient and ongoing project of renewing and bringing good into the world. This is posed in ancient Egyptian spiritual and ethical texts as a collaborative effort of world maintenance by humans and the divine. Here collaborative communicative discourse and action as Maat-doing restores and repairs the world, which is constantly damaged and undone by things we do wrong and fail to do right. And the damage and the repair occur in the ecological, social, and ontological senses. Therefore, the autobiographies urge us to engage in the collaborative practice of serudj ta:

The Reciprocal Solidarity and Cooperation of Humanity

Finally, African communicative practice is concerned for and committed to the reciprocal solidarity and cooperation for the mutual benefit of humanity. In its insistence on the ethical criticism of artificial eloquence, deceptive discourse and instrumental reasoning against the greater interest of humanity, it calls for an ethical judgment of rhetoric itself (Garver 1998; Hamlet 1998; Biesecker 1992). Moreover, it raises the issue of the closed and limited public square and calls for its opening in ways that enhance and nurture meaningful and substantive human exchange (Asante 1998; Hauser 1998; De Certeau 1984). And with the prime minister Rekhmira and the peasant Khunanup, it calls for justice for all the people. For as the Instructions to Rekhmira say, “He who does justice for all the people, he is truly the prime minister,” that is, the rightful leader who governs according to Maat. In the Book of Khunanup, Khunanup, the eloquent peasant, gives nine rhetorical disquisitions on Maat in his petition for justice in society and the world to the high steward, Rensi (Parkinson 1991; Assmann 1990; Karenga 1984, 29–35). Certainly he stands symbolically for all marginalized and oppressed people who step forward to speak truth and insist on justice based on an ethical system, Maat, that transcends the established order. It is he who gives the classic Kemetic critique of hegemonic discourse and action and calls for truth and justice in the land, saying, “Speak truth. Do justice. For Maat (Rightness) is mighty; it is great, it endures and it leads one to blessedness.” In fact, he says, “Maat (truth and justice) is breath to the nose.” And again, “[t]he balancing of the earth lies in doing Maat.”

The principle of reciprocal solidarity is also stressed by Khunanup. He says that “a good-deed is remembered,” therefore to “do to the doer that he may also do” (Lichtheim 1975–80, 174). Jan Assmann (1990, 66 ff) states that Maat, expressed in the Book of Khunanup, yields a concept of solidarity that has two basic aspects—a solidarity of action and a solidarity of understanding. In these forms of solidarity, there is not only the mutual acting for one another (Füreinander-Handelns), but also mutual consideration and thoughtfulness with and toward each other (Aneinander-Denkens). But the conceptual grounding for both of these is communicative solidarity, which is based on the art of hearing (Kunst Hörens), a profound and ongoing mutual responsiveness and responsibility to one another. Lady Ta-Aset also speaks to the virtue of reciprocity, saying that “doing good is not difficult; just speaking good is a monument for one who does it. For those who do good for others are actually doing it for themselves” (Karenga 1994, 229). This ethical orientation is reaffirmed later in the teachings of Orunmila in the Odù Ifá when he says that “doing good worldwide is the best example of character” (166: 2). Indeed, it is a fundamental African understanding that all great good is a shared good, that is, requires being shared with others for its true fulfillment and just enjoyment. Among these goods are life, freedom, justice, family, friendship, and love. It is in this context of the focus on rhetoric as ethical activity in pursuit and benefit of the common good that Carter G. Woodson argues that “true oratory, then, has regard to truth and justice. There must be some lofty purpose in the eloquent appeal which stands the test of time” (1925, 7). And again, this “lofty purpose” must be rooted in and reflective of the enduring ethical concerns of shared human good.

It is important to reiterate the central importance Africans have placed on the creative power of the word, nommo, medu nefer, eloquent and effective speech. This is reaffirmed in the Hon. Marcus Garvey’s assertion in one of his many speeches that “as soon as we were freed, we made a rush to get the book” and to master its materials in the interest of self-determination and human progress (1983, 119, italics mine). For we understood the power of the word, written as well as spoken, and its key role as knowledge in enhancing our capacity to control our destiny and daily lives and live truly free, full and meaningful lives. But again, as argued above, we treasured the spoken word in a special and expansive way, even when we also wrote it down throughout history. Perhaps no one has summed up this expansive concept and profound appreciation of speech—spoken and written—better than Frederick Douglass, a master orator in his own right. He says,

It is this retrieved and reaffirmed understanding of speech that forms the core and consciousness of African communicative practice, which at its best is directed toward the ongoing historical project to build and sustain community and constantly bring good into the world.

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