The success of Vietnam's August Revolution of 1945 can be attributed in part to Ho Chi Minh's reconstitutive rhetoric, a form of rhetorical discourse that gave the Vietnamese people a new sense of identification. This reawakened identity in turn influenced a renewed demand for nationalism and independence. This study explores the reconstitutive rhetoric of Ho Chi Minh. In doing so, it advances rhetorical theory founded on nonWestern premises and examines the cultural differences responsible for creating a rhetoric whose focus is nonEurocentric.

Most current thinking on reconstitutive...