ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses three types of ideological critique: Deconstructionist, Marxist, and postcolonial criticism. Deconstructionists have been accused of being anarchists who treat communication as an impossibility and who are, as a result, just radical debunkers. Their detractors charge that deconstructionists flee from the patient work of disciplined criticism. Although most users of social media may have never heard of deconstruction, the ubiquity of Internet memes illustrates how deeply these deconstructionist tendencies have been instilled in contemporary culture. Partly because deconstruction was first used in literary studies, but mostly because they are quintessential skeptics, deconstructionists approach rhetoric as if it were literature. Marxist critics explore what rhetoric conceals—its unargued premises. Unless required to do otherwise, rhetoric will follow the path of least resistance, tapping values rooted in the political and economic priorities society has already established. Postcolonial critics seek to expose the insidious influence of colonialism on the minds of colonizer and colonized, alike.
