| dc.description.abstract | Historic preservation of African American neighborhoods in Oklahoma City values restoration of buildings and objects but fails to authentically preserve or respect the original culture by actively excluding the Black community from Deep Deuce. Oklahoma City's rhetoric surrounding Deep Deuce refers to urban change as "revitalization," yet it continues to repeat history by neglecting the Black community of Oklahoma City. Theory from rhetoricians, Kenneth Burke and Michel Foucault, are used to create a rhetorical lens that centers power, influence, and discourse. For gentrification scholarship, several scholarly articles are used for the survey of scholarship. The books, Color of Law and Root Shock, are heavily referenced in the project and interviews completed with community members of Oklahoma City are used as primary sources. Oklahoma City states they have historically preserved Deep Deuce, a traditionally African American neighborhood; the rhetoric of their preservation methods, however, reveal that the city has weaponized the land in the past and present to dismantle the local Black community and whitewashes their history to attract tourists and residents to the gentrified neighborhood. These findings are significant in challenging the fact that the city officials state that they are historically preserving an area and challenging their profit-driven motives. It shows the disconnect between preserving the physical environment and preserving the community itself. By cutting off the Black community from the preservation process, failing to include them in the new community, and failing to take responsibility for large contributions to the past destruction of the original community, the city is not authentically and respectfully preserving the space. Suggestions for future research includes further exploring this topic through the lens of Rhetoric of Choice which challenges how those with power and influence, such as the local, state, and federal government shed responsibility for their racist actions, policies, and laws by using rhetoric that states that these things are the cause of individual citizens making choices that do not involve the government or those in power. | en_US |
