The ‘Shocking Story’ of Emmett Till and the Politics of Public Confession
Issue Date
2008-05Author
Tell, Dave
Publisher
Taylor & Francis (Routledge)
Type
Article
Article Version
Scholarly/refereed, author accepted manuscript
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
In 1955, journalist William Bradford Huie interviewed Emmett Till’s killers and published their confession in Look magazine. Entitled "The Shocking Story of Approved Murder in Mississippi," Huie’s tale dominated the remembrance of Emmett Till for nearly fifty years. This essay argues that the power of the “Shocking Story” to control the memory of Till’s murder resides in its recourse to the “expressive confession,” the distinctive power of which is a capacity to naturalize historical events and thereby constitute a master narrative of inevitably in which further rhetorical intervention seems unnecessary. So understood, the “Shocking Story” is not just one more recounting of Till’s untimely death, it is also a treatise about the role of speech in the violence of the Mississippi Delta.
Description
This is the author's accepted manuscript. The published version is available from Taylor & Francis: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00335630801975426
Collections
Citation
Tell, Dave. “The ‘Shocking Story’ of Emmett Till and the Politics of Public Confession.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 94.2 (May 2008): 156-178. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00335630801975426
Items in KU ScholarWorks are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.
We want to hear from you! Please share your stories about how Open Access to this item benefits YOU.