Colonizing the borderlands: Shifting circumference in the rhetoric of Malcolm X

In the last year of his life, Malcolm X was faced with the task of crafting a viable public voice while remaining unfettered by existing ideologies. I n a speech he delivered less than a week before he died, Malcolm addresses this task by repeatedly shifting the scene within which he asks his audienc e to define themselves. He explores the possibilities and the limitations o f both the domestic and international scenes, and finally invites his audie nce to position themselves at the border between the two. There, he and his African-American audience might take advantage of the redefinitional poten tial of international identification without abdicating their rightful dome stic position.