It Takes a Village to Change the World: Proverbial Politics and the Ethics of Place

Abstract

Proverbs in political rhetoric help grassroots efforts to bring about human and social improvements regionally, nationally, and globally. Drawing on the proverbial prowess of such national figures as Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Barack Obama, and others, it will be shown that they employ proverbs based on spatial metaphors or proverbs in general that help to bring into focus the ethics of place that is ever more concerned with global matters. Proverbs as monumenta humana" are part and parcel of the ongoing struggle towards progress on many social and political fronts in an interconnected world. As traditional and also more recent shared wisdom, proverbs play a significant role in relating local and national issues to the global sphere of politics aimed at the equality of all people and their inalienable right for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.