Abstract

This article uses a lengthy critique of Kenneth Burke's Attitudes Toward History found in the Kenneth Burke Papers as well as Kenneth Burke's published writing to argue for a more expansive view of his comic theory, one that sees Burke's comic theory as a basis for ethical rhetorical engagement. Rather than defining the comic as a Burkean rhetorical device that is relevant to only a select number of texts and situations, this account of Burke's comic theory suggests it has broad applicability. Engaging Burke's comic theory as an ethic allows for active, generous, exigent, and self-reflective scholarship.

Journal
Philosophy & Rhetoric
Published
2017-08-15
DOI
10.5325/philrhet.50.3.0315
Open Access
Closed
Topics

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (0)

No articles in this index cite this work.

Cites in this index (3)

  1. Rhetoric Society Quarterly
  2. Rhetoric Society Quarterly
  3. Rhetoric Review
Also cites 18 works outside this index ↓
  1. Appel, Edward C. 1997. “The Rhetoric of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: Comedy and Context in Tragic Collision.”…
  2. Barrett, Elizabeth. 1984. “Comedy, Courtesy, and A Passage to India.” English Studies in Canada 10 (1): 77–93.
  3. Bonnstetter, Beth E. 2011. “Mel Brooks Meets Kenneth Burke (and Mikhail Bakhtin): Comedy and Burlesque in Sat…
  4. Burke, Kenneth. 1969 [1945]. A Grammar of Motives. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  5. Burke, Kenneth. 1973a [1941]. “Reading While You Run: An Exercise in Translation From English to English.” In…
  6. Burke, Kenneth. 1984 [1959]. Attitudes Toward History. 3rd ed. Berkeley: University of California Press.
  7. Carlson, Cheree. 1986. “Gandhi and the Comic Frame: ‘Ad Bellum Purificandum.’” Quarterly Journal of Speech 72…
  8. Carlson, Cheree. 1988. “Limitations on the Comic Frame: Some Witty American Women of the Nineteenth Century.”…
  9. Christiansen, Adrienne E., and Jeremy J. Hanson. 1996. “Comedy as Cure for Tragedy: Act Up and the Rhetoric o…
  10. Hawhee, Debra. 2006. “Language as Sensuous Action: Sir Richard Paget, Kenneth Burke, and Gesture-Speech Theor…
  11. Herrick, James A. 1992. “Rhetoric, Ethics, and Virtue.” Communication Studies 43 (3): 133–49.
  12. McMahon, Robert. 1989. “Kenneth Burke's Divine Comedy: The Literary Form of the Rhetoric of Religion.” PMLA 1…
  13. Murray, Jeffrey W. 1998. “An Other Ethics for Kenneth Burke.” Communication Studies 49 (1): 29–48.
  14. Powell, Kimberly A. 1995. “The Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching: Strategies of a …
  15. Renegar, Valerie R., and George N. Dionisopoulos. 2011. “The Dream of a Cyberpunk Future? Entelechy, Dialecti…
  16. Silverman, Rachel E. 2013. “Comedy as Correction: Humor as Perspective by Incongruity on Will & Grace and Que…
  17. Waisanen, Don J. 2009. “A Citizen's Guides to Democracy Inaction: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert's Comic Rhe…
  18. Walters, Shannon. 2013. “Cool Aspie Humor: Cognitive Difference and Kenneth Burke's Comic Corrective in The B…
CrossRef global citation count: 2 View in citation network →