Rhetoric in Debt

Household debt in the US has reached record levels, viewed as a cultural system rather than just an economic indicator. Kellie Sharp-Hoskins critiques debt through case studies of the student-loan crisis, medical debt, and municipal bond abuses, revealing how it exacerbates vulnerabilities and inequities. She offers a new perspective on debt and a conceptual framework for a more equitable world.

Format: Hardback
Length: 204 pages
Publication date: 13 June 2023
Publisher: Pennsylvania State University Press

In recent years, the United States has witnessed a historic surge in household indebtedness, encompassing a wide range of financial obligations such as mortgages, student loans, credit card bills, and US deficit spending. This pervasive and growing debt has become a significant cultural system, rather than merely an economic indicator or a financial tool.

Kellie Sharp-Hoskins, in her insightful critique, challenges the conventional understanding of debt by examining it through the lens of economics, accounting, critical rhetoric, and social theory. She argues that debt should be viewed not as a mere economic metric or a means of financing but as a cultural system that is intricately intertwined with broader systems of wealth, power, and race.

Through detailed case studies of the student-loan crisis, medical debt, and the abuses of municipal bonds, Sharp-Hoskins exposes the rhetorical nature of debt and its profound impact on society. She demonstrates how debt serves as a powerful construct that perpetuates disparities between the wealthy and the poor, the productive and the lazy, the secure and the risky, and the worthy and the unworthy.

By tracing the emergence and workings of debt across different temporal and spatial scales, Sharp-Hoskins highlights how it exacerbates vulnerabilities and inequalities, masking itself under the guise of individual moral and volitional calculation and equivalency. This book offers a fresh perspective on a pressing societal issue, providing insights into how debt organizes our social and cultural relations while also offering a new conceptual framework for creating a more equitable world.

Weight: 454g
Dimension: 229 x 152 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780271095301