Grim Fairy Tales The Rhetorical Construction of American Welfare Policy

Subjects:

• Communications » Political Communications
• Political Science » Public Policy
• Sociology » Social Work

Reviews:

• Very much as Christopher Martin does in Framed! Labor and the Corporate Media (CH, Jun'04), Gring-Pemble demonstrates that the way an issue is presented strongly influences the way it is handled. The present volume goes beyond Framed! in that the author applies sophisticated rhetorical theory to her subject. The "fairy tales" of the title are the anecdotal "evidence" used by politicians to justify welfare policy decisions....Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty; professionals; general readers.
  —Choice July 2004

Table of Contents:

• The Changing Faces of American Welfare Policy: Historical Roots of Contemporary Welfare Legislation
• Welfare Legislation Is Symbolic: An Introduction
• American Social Welfare Policy in Context, 1600-1935
• American Social Welfare Policy in Context, 1940-2002
• Rhetorical Constructions of Welfare Recipients and Welfare Families in United States Congressional Hearing and Debates
• "Are We Going to Now Govern by Anecdote?": Rhetorical Constructions of Welfare Recipients in the Congressional Hearings, Debates, and Legislation, 1992-2002
• Legislating a "Normal Classic Family": The Rhetorical Construction of Families in American Welfare Policy
• The Rhetorical Force of Depiction in American Welfare Policy
• In Search of an Exigence to Warrant Reform: Public Opinion, Policy Research, and Anecdotal Evidence
• American Welfare Policy and the Ineluctable Appeal of Language: Conclusion and Implications