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Key Concepts
Contemporary: something that is ongoing and happening right now.
Contentious: an issue that has multiple groups (or stakeholders) offering differing perspectives.
Stakeholders (a.k.a. constituents): people or groups that have a reason to care about a particular issue.
In the previous chapter, we discussed why it’s necessary to seek out diverse perspectives, specifically in the section titled “Expanding the Publications and Venues You Consult.” In this chapter, we’ll be focusing further on how, exactly, to do that.
Contemporary + Contentious + Stakeholders
When we combine the terms listed above (in the “Key Concepts” section) as we begin the research process, we see that contemporary contentious issues with multiple stakeholders involve ongoing conversations that are currently happening in various venues of public discourse. Indeed, something can be contemporary without being overtly contentious. For instance, the day’s weather in a given region is an example of a contemporary topic, but not one that is overtly contentious. (However, of course, there are certainly robust debates about Climate Change in public discourse, but these are separate from the temperature and level of precipitation on an individual day.) Equally, an issue can be contentious without necessarily tapping into something that is contemporary. For example, the issue of Freedom of Speech in America is something that many different stakeholders have differing and even powerful opinions about, but it’s not something that is often discussed abstractly, totally separate from things that are happening in the world. Instead, events that are ongoing in the world afford stakeholders the opportunity to tap into conversations about Freedom of Speech as they relate to those events. For example, when a social media company changes its policies to restrict users from posting certain kinds of content (however objectionable that content might be deemed), it opens up the space for folks to offer their informed perspectives on why that might be a good thing or a bad thing (or, more likely, why it might be both a good and bad thing simultaneously). In rhetoric, we refer to this kind of situation as a kairos—that is, a current event that, through discussion, offers us a portal into a larger, ongoing and potentially irresolvable debate.
Equally, as noted in the previous chapter, when we’re beginning to think about contemporary contentious issues, it’s necessary to seek out a variety of perspectives—ones from diverse stakeholders—so that we can get a clear sense of the discussions that are happening about the issue we’re researching and writing about. Indeed, if we’re only looking at our issue through one lens—without fully seeking out and understanding what a diverse collection of voices are saying about our subject—we would have information that exists in a bubble. Imagine, for example, if we only ever conceptualized abortion through the lens of opponents to Planned Parenthood (or pr