Both a content analysis using Flesch Reading Ease Formula and other linguistic measures, and a traditional Aristotelian critical examination, were designed to determine why graduate students and faculty members alike find Kenneth Burke's writings difficult to read and to comprehend. This is especially true of the sections dealing with agency and purpose, two of the units of the dramatistic pentad. Critics have labelled the pentad an agency tool, because it is the process taxonomy to activate Burke's theory of identification. / A survey of the philosophic substructures of the pentad (act, scene, agent, agency and purpose), and the areas of agency, especially, revealed a major weakness in the construct: the mystic perspective of purpose does not allow for the non-mystic outlook of either the rhetor or the critic. / Application of the Flesch Reading Ease Formula and the Gunning Fog Index was unsatisfactory, because the sections proved to be readable at the college freshman level. This does not agree with the consensus of rhetorical scholars, students and faculty. / When the study turned to a traditional Aristotelian approach, it was determined that the reading difficulty stems from poor organization, changing definition of terms, and most especially, a dialectic style that goes around a point with many digressions before coming to that point. / This study concludes that beginning readers of Burke begin with "The Rhetoric of Hitler's 'Battle,'" a very readable example of Burkean criticism. Then the reader should move on to the "Introduction" of A Grammar of Motives, which presents the pentad. Finally, the reader could attempt Part I of Permanence and Change, before going on to other Burkean writing. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-08, Section: A, page: 2302. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1984.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_75355 |
| Contributors | COLLINS, MARY EVELYN., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 176 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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