Abstract

A recent surge among scholars of rhetoric seeking to refine and redefine approaches to the study of demagoguery and its rhetorical contours supplies an opportunity to raise a related yet more fundamental question: What is rhetoric’s relationship to democracy, demagoguery’s presupposed injured? Inspired by Jacques Rancière and a rereading of ancient Greek sources, this article seeks to complicate the relationship between rhetoric and democracy by narrowing in on the activity of the _dēmos_, a political entity undersigning both democracy and demagoguery. In so doing, this article argues that demagoguery appears not as a violation of democratic activity but as a rhetorical phenomenon associated with democratic fulfillment. This article showcases the implications of rethinking demagoguery as a sign of an active and energetic _dēmos_ by revisiting the rhetorical work of the farm workers movement. Rhetoric and democracy, the article concludes, support demagoguery and demagoguery uplifts democracy and rhetoric.