Combining Freud’s psychological insights with the dialectical approach of Marx, Burke created a dramatistic frame for rhetoric that made him one of the most interesting critics of the twentieth century (Smith 275).
Burke follows the epistemology that language does not shape reality, but rather alters reality. He saw humans as symbol users and claimed that the use of symbols is what separates humans from animals. His epistemology led Burke to define rhetoric as “symbolic inducement,” or the attempt to move others in desired directions through the manipulation of symbols (Smith 276).
Burke also believed that the use of rhetoric is ontological; it reveals how we operate and how we exist (Smith 276). Smith states that, “Because human communication is symbolic – that is, because it represents or stands for something – it is also ‘dramatistic’” (Smith 276). Therefore, if all language represents something, the language itself is not reality.
One of Burke’s most important concepts in rhetoric is persuasion. Burke uses the term “identification” to emphasize that humans identify with people they share traits with. According to Burke’s ideas about rhetoric, identification is the key to persuasion.
Burke further proves this point when he says, “You persuade a man only insofar as you can talk his language by speech, gesture, tonality, order, image, attitude, idea, identifying your ways with his.”
Another one of Burke’s major ideas is his “Definition of Man.” He believes that these five human conditions apply to all people:
1. Symbol-making and using animals
2. Inventors of the negative
3. Separated from natural conditions by instruments of our own making
4. Goaded by spirit of hierarchy
5. Rotten with perfection
Burke also created The Pentad which contains five terms: act, actor, agency, scene, and purpose. He believed that these terms are based on five standard questions for any good story: who, what, when, where and why and that many speakers are successful because they have the ability to use the dramatic techniques in the rhetorical arena (Smith 282).
One of Burke’s most famous works is his “Terministic Screens” from Rhetoric of Religion. He argues for the distinction between a “scientistic” and “dramatistic” approach to the nature of language. The “scientistic” approach deals with the power of language to define and describe while the “dramatistic” approach stresses language as an aspect of “action” or “symbolic action” (Burke 44-45).
Every time we use language we create a screen. Burke says, “Even if any given terminology is a reflection of reality, by its very nature as a terminology it must be a selection of reality; and to this extent it must function also as a deflection of reality” (Burke 45). Following this definition of terministic screens, Burke is saying that there is no “true” or “real” reality, just multiple ones competing for attention.
In his “Terministic Screens,” Burke coins the term logology which he defines as the systematic study of theological terms, not from the standpoint of their truth or falsity as statements about the supernatural, but purely for the light they might throw upon the forms of language (Burke 47).
Burke also states that there are two types of terms. The first is continuity which are terms that put things together. The second is discontinuity which are terms that take things apart. Discontinuity can be further broken down into degree and kind which can be distinguished through the example that Darwin sees only a difference of degree between man and other animals but the theologian sees a difference in kind.
Burke’s ideas about the use of terministic screens as multiple realities competing for attention relates back to his epistemology that language does not shape reality, but alters it, leading to his definition of rhetoric as “symbolic inducement.”
Burke follows the epistemology that language does not shape reality, but rather alters reality. He saw humans as symbol users and claimed that the use of symbols is what separates humans from animals. His epistemology led Burke to define rhetoric as “symbolic inducement,” or the attempt to move others in desired directions through the manipulation of symbols (Smith 276).
Burke also believed that the use of rhetoric is ontological; it reveals how we operate and how we exist (Smith 276). Smith states that, “Because human communication is symbolic – that is, because it represents or stands for something – it is also ‘dramatistic’” (Smith 276). Therefore, if all language represents something, the language itself is not reality.
One of Burke’s most important concepts in rhetoric is persuasion. Burke uses the term “identification” to emphasize that humans identify with people they share traits with. According to Burke’s ideas about rhetoric, identification is the key to persuasion.
Burke further proves this point when he says, “You persuade a man only insofar as you can talk his language by speech, gesture, tonality, order, image, attitude, idea, identifying your ways with his.”
Another one of Burke’s major ideas is his “Definition of Man.” He believes that these five human conditions apply to all people:
1. Symbol-making and using animals
2. Inventors of the negative
3. Separated from natural conditions by instruments of our own making
4. Goaded by spirit of hierarchy
5. Rotten with perfection
Burke also created The Pentad which contains five terms: act, actor, agency, scene, and purpose. He believed that these terms are based on five standard questions for any good story: who, what, when, where and why and that many speakers are successful because they have the ability to use the dramatic techniques in the rhetorical arena (Smith 282).
One of Burke’s most famous works is his “Terministic Screens” from Rhetoric of Religion. He argues for the distinction between a “scientistic” and “dramatistic” approach to the nature of language. The “scientistic” approach deals with the power of language to define and describe while the “dramatistic” approach stresses language as an aspect of “action” or “symbolic action” (Burke 44-45).
Every time we use language we create a screen. Burke says, “Even if any given terminology is a reflection of reality, by its very nature as a terminology it must be a selection of reality; and to this extent it must function also as a deflection of reality” (Burke 45). Following this definition of terministic screens, Burke is saying that there is no “true” or “real” reality, just multiple ones competing for attention.
In his “Terministic Screens,” Burke coins the term logology which he defines as the systematic study of theological terms, not from the standpoint of their truth or falsity as statements about the supernatural, but purely for the light they might throw upon the forms of language (Burke 47).
Burke also states that there are two types of terms. The first is continuity which are terms that put things together. The second is discontinuity which are terms that take things apart. Discontinuity can be further broken down into degree and kind which can be distinguished through the example that Darwin sees only a difference of degree between man and other animals but the theologian sees a difference in kind.
Burke’s ideas about the use of terministic screens as multiple realities competing for attention relates back to his epistemology that language does not shape reality, but alters it, leading to his definition of rhetoric as “symbolic inducement.”