Reclaiming Malintzin: Epideictic Practices of a Chicana Rhetoric

Abstract

This article analyzes the epideictic practices Chicana rhetors use to reclaim the figure of Malintzin, a woman cast as a promiscuous traitor for her role in the Spanish conquest. Since the figure of la Malinche was used to shame Chicana feminists as the traitors of the Chicano movement, Chicanas responded by first rejecting the narrative of la Malinche through rhetorical delinking, reframing her story with the use of amplification and depreciation, and finally reclaiming Malintzin as an aspirational symbol for Chicana feminists. Chicana epideictic makes a political argument about the value and worth of Chicana feminists by praising the Malintzin figure. Chicana epideictic challenges and celebrates community values and blurs the line between epideictic and deliberative rhetoric.