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Peter A. DeCaro, RHETORIC OF REVOLT: HO CHI MINH'S DISCOURSE FOR REVOLUTION. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003; pp. 152, $64.95 hardcover, ISBN: 0275974111.
Peter DeCaro's Rhetoric of Revolt attempts to fill a void in rhetorical scholarship concerning the discourse of Ho Chi Minh. In chapter 1, DeCaro notes that for various reasons scholars in the West have failed to look critically at the contributions of a pivotal figure in the history of Vietnam. As a revolutionary and a political leader, Ho Chi Minh embodied the aspirations of the Vietnamese people in their fight against colonialism. In his study, DeCaro seeks a better understanding of Minh's ability to reconstitute the essence of the Vietnamese people in his rhetoric. Crucial to this understanding is DeCaro's ability to avoid the traditional ethnocentric bias of judging Eastern discourse by Western standards. DeCaro's familiarity with Sino-Vietnamese culture allows him to assess Minh's rhetoric in terms of the politics and philosophy that undergird it.
In chapter 2, DeCaro provides a biographical account of Ho Chi Minh from his birth in 1890 to 1945 when he forced the abdication of Emperor Bao Dai and became president of the newly founded Democratic Republic of Vietnam. What makes this biographical account interesting is that the reader learns that Ho Chi Minh is a man of many names...