Fictionality as a Rhetorical Tool in Political Mockumentary Films: The Interplay of Fictionality and Factuality in C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America

How can a mockumentary film like Kevin Willmott’s C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America argue effectively and authenticate its important message about the presence of racism and discrimination in contemporary American society with a narrative that is obviously fictional? Doesn’t this method of presenting an alternative history of the nation create mistrust and suspicion in the audience, instead of giving them profound insight into the actual states of things? The ambiguity of such mockumentaries stems from the simultaneous application of two major types of rhetorical frames: They always utilize some style or variant of the documentary genre (Juhasz et al., F Is for Phony: Fake Documentary and Truth’s Undoing. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2006, 7) (evoking a factual discourse), but—to a differing degree—also undermining, suspending, or putting it between quotation marks (evoking a fictional discourse). In this paper, I want to argue that with the innovative utilization of fictionality and factuality as communicational tools and rhetorical resources, a politically charged fake documentary such as Willmott’s film can explore problematic dimensions of social reality and shed light on its subject matter from a novel perspective.