Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Burke's pentad'

Critical pedagogy, a teaching philosophy that encourages critical reflection in students so that they may expose and change oppressive societal structures, has been plagued by criticisms from a variety of sources. Critics charge that critical pedagogy is marred by irreconcilable contradictions such as its inappropriateness for non-oppressed students, its neglect of students? needs, and its unsuitability for most instructors privileged by the dominant ideology. Examining the internal consistency of Kenneth Burke?s pentadic ratios can be a useful tool for analyzing these contradictions, specifically those related to scene-act, agent-purpose, and act-agent. However, these contradictions, inherent in the very nature of critical pedagogy, seem to defy Burke?s pentad. Without inconsistencies between critical pedagogy, its purpose, its agents, and the broader scene in which it operates, the impetus for the enactment of critical pedagogy would not be present. Therefore, instead of seeking to deny or eradicate contradiction, critical theorists and educators need to make use of it in their own philosophies and practices. Because both critical educators and their students should confront and grapple with these contradictions in critical practice, the apparent flaws in critical pedagogy can actually encourage the critical consciousness that is the goal of the enterprise.

In this thesis, a review of Kenneth Burke's use of the term attitude in his published works as well as in some unpublished notes, drafts and letters, is performed. Three periods of different usage are found. Early works feature a pervasive attitude with elements of both body and mind. This attitude is then subsumed into the pentad and the physiological connection is diminished, but attitude is given an important function as a connective between action and motion. The later Burke reinstates attitude as central to his theory of symbolic action, reconnects it to the physiological and includes it in the Pentad with parsimony-inducing effect. The attitude is then found to aid rhetorical analysis and show promise in being able to help analyse expressions not wholly in the realm of the conscious, be they in the form of a Bourdieu social practice or barely conscious rhetorical markers in conversation.

Forum Conversations is an organisational theatre method for helping individuals to deal with their difficult conversations in the workplace. It uses professional actors to simulate participants’ ‘difficult others’ and to play out confrontational conversations from participants’ own experience. This study adds to the empirical base of research into organisational theatre. It further conceptualises organisational theatre methods as reflective or refractive. This qualitative, interpretive study examines the perspectives of both participants and actors through a dramatistic lens and also assesses if and how the Forum Conversations method has affected changes in behaviour and approach in the ways individual participants communicate with others in the workplace. In this assessment a novel, methodological approach based on attributions made by participants was used to make comparisons between individuals’ pre- and post- Forum Conversations views about their difficult conversations. Outcomes included improvements in confidence and awareness but also of agency in participants’ dealings with others. The interaction between actors and participants is discussed in terms of a partial dialogism that dwells in the moment of exchange between interactants. From the actors’ side the study highlights the subtly layered reflexivity of the actors in process and also of their tendency to accentuate performance skills. In this context, the interaction is seen to compare with the way professional actors might use rehearsal to prepare for theatre performance. Overall, it is concluded that Forum Conversations is a powerful learning method that enables participants to embody their learning experience and leads to sustained individual change that occasionally includes personal transformation both at work and at home.

As society and business is becoming more complex, the creation and management of knowledge attracts more attention. For intelligence research it offers an alternative perspective on the art and science of intelligence that challenges a previous dominance of strategy and decision-making theories. The article is based on semi-structured interviews with intelligence personnel in four different multinational companies. Through the use of Burke’s pentad this article gives an account of important challenges encountered by intelligence personnel in modern business organizations due to an increasing dependence on different knowledge processes. These challenges are summarized in four central tasks for knowledge activists; that is to initiate and focus knowledge creation, to reduce the time and cost needed for knowledge creation, to leverage knowledge creation initiatives throughout the corporation and to guide knowledge creation by the instigation of complementary reference points. By engaging in these types of activities intelligence workers are able to stage and influence different sorts of analytical conversations, where the insights from these conversations as reformed knowledge govern an evolving strategy in dispersed circumstances. Thus, intelligence workers fulfil their purpose, which in this perspective can be viewed as creating better business in whatever process they engage in.

In just five years West Virginia was rocked with two devastating disasters in the coal mining industry. Despite the disasters, West Virginians could not just walk away from the mines, as they depended on the coal industry for jobs and tax revenue. West Virginia had built a purpose-driven orientation towards the coal industry through a historical and current dependency on coal. However, the two disasters had a chance to alter that dominant orientation. In order to understand how or if the coal orientation was altered, by the disaster or the discourse that followed, a pentadic analysis was completed. The analysis revealed that the coal companies constantly battled a tension between the elements of agency and purpose, while trying to overcome a scene that made safety challenging. In the end, one mining company altered the purpose-driven orientation, as the other reinforced the orientation. As both of the situations offered different orientations towards coalmining, their orientations showed that coal companies can be purpose-driven providers but also a responsible provider, understanding not only that miners need a paycheck, but also safety. In the end, when companies use the purpose-driven orientation, created from the history, present, and future of the West Virginia coal industry, their orientation drives profits and reduces the importance of safety for the coal miners, making coal mining a risky business. However, after just one disaster, despite the mining company\'s orientation, the companies become providers to no one
Master of Arts

The purpose of this essay is to understand the rhetoric presented by Henry V in Shakespeare’s St. Crispin’s day speech. More specifically, it examines the speech from a "dramatistic" point of view, i.e. the way Henry V is labeling agent, scene, act, agency and purpose in the narrative that his rhetoric constitutes. These labels are in themselves strategic spots, allowing the rhetorician to stage a reality that seeks to promote certain ways of thinking, feeling and acting that are beneficial to him. By examining these labels closely, we gain knowledge of their workings and – perhaps more importantly – their interchangeability. The analysis is based on Kenneth Burke’s dramatistic pentad and his ideas on how dialectical transformation can deepen our understanding of certain representations of reality. The methodology used is mostly that of Kenneth Burke when dealing with the elements of the pentad and its transformations, found in his work A grammar of motives. But it is also inspired by Hahn & Morlando’s (1979) Burkean analysis of Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address. The main conclusion is that Henry V overcomes his rhetorical obstacles (his men’s lack of motivation and questioning of the war) by reducing his narrative to the purpose. This purpose (and key term) is "honor", treated by Henry V as a term primarily rooted in the act, which is beneficial to his cause, since it allows men of all ranks to view themselves capable of gaining honor by performing the act of fighting. Furthermore, his focus on honor (and its dreaded counterpart – mediocrity and unmanliness) has the added side effect of drawing attention from some of his men’s critique of the war.

Den här uppsatsen syftar till att undersöka hur trovärdighet i reklam skapas genom vilka val som görs när det kommer till narratologiska och filmtekniska komponenter. Genom en kritisk retorikanalys med stöd av narratologi och filmteknisk teori, granskas reklamfilmen ​Gunde Svan och sjungande grenar som drivmedelsbolaget Preem gav ut hösten 2019. I analysen framkommer det att Preem bygger sin trovärdighet i frågan på ethos- och pathosargumentation, där Gunde Svan och de sjungande grenarna spelar en stark roll i det narratologiska, med hjälp av filmtekniska aspekter som iscensättning, ljud och ljus.Sökord: Grön marknadsföring, Greenwashing, Kritisk retorikanalys, Trovärdighet i reklam, Burkes pentad, Filmtekniska komponenter.
This paper aims to investigate how credibility in advertising is created through what choices are made when it comes to narratological and film-technical components. Through a critical rhetorical analysis supported by narratology and cinematic theory, the commercial ​Gunde Svan och sjungande grenar, ​issued by the fuel company Preem in the fall 2019 is examined. The analysis reveals that Preem builds its credibility on the issue on ethos and pathos reasoning, where Gunde Svan and the branches play strong roles in the narratological, with the help of film-technical aspects such as staging, sound and light.Keywords: Green marketing, Greenwashing, Critical rhetorical analysis, Credibility in advertising, Burke’s Pentad, Film style

This thesis seeks a portable and accessible model for centralising photographs in enquiry. I argue that photographs are potent sites of human value making but are typically relegated to illustrating word-based considerations, while the vast mass of ‘ordinary’ photographs are excluded from even this function. The context in which I develop and test the model is the heroic era of Antarctic exploration, a time and place that is dominated by an entrenched mythology, and where photographs have been assigned a merely pictorial role. In seeking to reactivate these objects and pictures I turn to Elizabeth Edwards’ notion of using photographs to think with, tracing the evolution of this idea through generations of thinking about photography, and emphasising recent writers such as Geoffrey Batchen, Margaret Olin and Joan Schwartz. My work confirms a resonance with Edwards’ thinking but also a need to emphasise photographic materiality and the photographic collective. Further, I demonstrate that this thinking also resonates with the work of Walter Benjamin and Roland Barthes, confirming a construction of photographs as generative anchoring points in networks of identification that are both culturalised and subjective. My model for thinking with photographs draws in Kenneth Burke’s pentad of dramatistic analysis, arguing a productive fit with his concern to filter the rhetorical detritus of human behaviour as an entrée to viewing core motivations. The pentad has not previously been used to think with photographs but it is able to be deployed successfully for this purpose by refreshing its operation in line with writers such as Robert Cathcart, James Chesebro and Gregory Clark. For Antarctica, thinking with photographs involves negotiating margins – depicted, physical, temporal and ideological, and in addressing the photographic mass this thesis argues a reactivation of margins as points of insight rather than barriers of exclusion. Recent writers such as Francis Spufford, Stephen Pyne, John Wylie and Kathryn Yusoff have found new ways to construct the performance of Antarctic exploration, and, in this spirit, the thesis enacts Burke’s pentad to think with the photograph collection of ‘second tier’ Antarctic explorer, Ernest Joyce. It shows Antarctic exploration to be also an intensely personal experience, with the power to overhaul mindsets but offering no guarantee that new expectations can be delivered on. In Joyce’s photographs it finds a nexus of contested narratives and contested photographies, and the seeds of a Benjaminian modernity that speak of the personal implications of the dissolution of meta-narratives.

This paper examines dialect as a rhetorical means of persuasion. A survey containing inquires about four different Swedish dialects have been handed out mainly in Södertörn University and Stockholm University, in order to research the values and connotations of theese dialects. The four chosen dialects are as following: Göteborgska, Stockholmska, Norrländska and Skånska. The results of the survey are processed and compiled to see which attitudes these values and connotations may indicate to each dialect. These attitudes and values are then discussed in correlation with five rhetorical theories: Attitude as a means of persuation, Ethos, Persona, Rhetorical Agency and Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of Field and Habitus. From this discussion, conclusions are drawn about whether dialect may be used as a means of persuasion. However, the values and attitudes presented from the survey represents only the survey participants, and cannot be regarded as a general opinion. Altough it is a small-scale survey, certain conclusions can be made. The author of this essay concludes that dialect may be used as a means of persuasion, based on the survey results and rhetorical theories presented above. Finally, a critical component for this rhetorical agent is the adjustment of the audience. Without knowing the audiences values and attitudes to the dialect, the outcome of the effect may be hard to predict.

In his first term as president, George W. Bush was confronted with one of the worst national attacks in United States history: the September 11 terrorist attacks of 2001. Through the devastation, however, President Bush triumphed in unifying and guiding this nation during what would become the height of his rhetorical leadership. Following his reelection in 2004, President Bush faced one of the worst natural disasters in the nationâ s history: Category 4 Hurricane Katrina. In its aftermath, Katrina became known as "one of the worst mishandled disasters ever." Utilizing Kenneth Burkeâ s pentad, this study analyzes the presidentâ s rhetorical response and the primetime network news coverage following each crisis in an attempt to determine how President Bush could fare so well in one instance, consoling and leading the American people, while falling short in his second major crisis during his term as president.
Master of Arts

Kenneth Burke's pentadic analysis has been a staple within the context of rhetorical criticism since the early days of critical communication studies. Throughout the years it has evolved from a heavy text criticism to application to film and documentary. The Armstrong Lie is another documentary that highlights the controversial actions of former seven-time Tour de France champion, Lance Armstrong. This film provides an opportunity in which the pentadic analysis can be applied in order to really dissect the message that is being told. Through application of the pentadic analysis to The Armstrong Lie it is possible to identify the true motivation of the documentary's director, Alex Gibney. The present study seeks to identify the true message being told through the narrative of the documentary. Alex Gibney's motivations come under question as to whether or not he was exonerating himself by lessening the controversy of what Lance Armstrong had done by cheating in a highly competitive sport by characterizing him more as a product of his environment.

Uppsatsen är en introduktion till positionering som retoriskt begrepp.  Jag tycker mig se en splittring i samhället och att en del av det övergripande problemet är att människor inte kan mötas i en diskussion utan, likt ett politiskt maktspel, tar avstånd ifrån oliktänkande. Om det finns en möjlighet att positionering kan vara en bidragande orsak till splittringen och det eskalerande debattklimatet så är det viktigt att vi förstår hur det fungerar.   Positionering är ett välbekant begrepp i vardagligt samtal, offentliga samtal och politisk diskurs. Dess betydelse och användning nyttjats också teoretiskt inom till exempel psykologi, sociologi och marknadskommunikation. Även i retorikvetenskapen är positionering välkänt och omdiskuterat, men där uppfattar jag att fenomenet ofta tas för givet. Det finns en implicit förståelse av positionering eftersom det utgör en viktig del av retoriken, övertalning blir överflödig utan alternativa positioner. Däremot saknar jag en explicit teoretisering av positionering som begrepp inom retoriken, vilket den här uppsatsen ämnar lägga en första grund för; min ambition är att uppmuntra en fortsatt granskning och retorisk teoretisering av begreppet positionering.   I första delen av uppsatsen presenteras en teoretisk genomgång av positionering förankrat i Kenneth Burkes dramatiska teori. I den andra delen tillämpas genomgången med en kortare analys där analysmaterialet består av kommentarerna till en film om köttproduktion publicerad på P3-Nyheters Facebooksida.   Sammantaget visar den teoretiska genomgången och delar av analysen på ett värde i att fokusera på positionering i en retorisk kontext. Uppsatsen bidrar även till en tydligare bild och en mer utvecklad förståelse av positionering och dess retoriska funktion.

In the following pages I assert that important rhetorical work is being carried out by aesthetic means in museums and memorials in order to facilitate experiences of identification. I describe in rhetorical terms how that work is done, especially within my primary artifact of study, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Specifically, this paper explores concepts developed in studies of epideictic rhetoric, the rhetoric of place, and museology. The theoretical framework of this paper is founded on the ideas of John Dewey and Kenneth Burke. Dewey<'>s theories discuss how we learn from experience and the role of the aesthetic in creating such an experience. Burke asserts that people are primed for rhetorical identification by specific settings or <&hyphen>œscenes,<&hyphen> which he expounds upon in his theory of the dramatic pentad. I believe that the setting of an aesthetically vivid scene creates an emotional ecology in which museum and memorial patrons can have meaningful experiences. Furthermore, these experiences educate the patrons<'> emotions by allowing them to identify with (and develop empathy for) narratives and groups that they had not previously. In short, aesthetic elements set the stage for a meaningful rhetorical experience to take place, which ideally allows patrons to congregate and identify with the values and ideas they are presented with in the exhibit.

The crisis on Wall Street. This essay is a comparative study of how two business newspapers report on the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings in September 2008. Seven articles from the Swedish European financial newspaper Affärsvärlden (Business World) and five articles from the Chinese-Asian news agency XINHUA FINANCE are examined. The aim is to analyze, understand and evaluate from a rhetorical perspective. My thesis is that rhetors storytelling can tell us more about how we cope with crisis in the global economic discourse. The texts can portray man as a narrative creature when identification as a rational actor is not enough.  The analytical methods used are linguistic analysis with an emphasis on metaphor analysis, narrative analysis based on pentad - Critical dramatism, and discourse analysis with doxological outlook.  The results show that both newspapers seek to defend the global economic discourse, but they do so in different ways. Affärsvärlden advocates calmness and conveys a cautious attitude. The heart of the crisis, as well as its solution, is on Wall Street. XINHUA advocates control and expresses confidence in authorities and the system. Asia is presented as Wall Street's savior.
Krisen på Wall Street. Uppsatsen är en komparativ studie av hur två affärstidningar berättar om banken Lehman Brothers Holdings konkurs i september 2008. Materialet för undersökningen är sju artiklar från den svenska europeiska finanstidningen Affärsvärlden och fem artiklar från den kinesiska asiatiska nyhetsbyrån ZINHUA FINANCE. Syftet är att analysera, förstå och värdera situationen från ett retoriskt perspektiv. Tesen är att tidningarna (retorerna) kan visa oss, via sina texter, berättelserna om en kris i den globalekonomiska diskursen. Texterna kan visa människan som narrativ varelse där identifikationen som rationell aktör inte räcker till. Analysmetoderna som används är lingvistisk analys med störst vikt vid metaforanalys, narrativ analys utifrån pentaden - kritisk dramatism, samt diskursanalys med doxologisk utblick. Resultatet visar att båda tidningarna strävar efter att försvara den globalekonomiska diskursen, fast de gör det på olika sätt. Affärsvärlden manar till lugn opch visar en avvaktande attityd. Räddningen och krisens centrum finns på Wall Street. XINHUA visar på kontroll och tilltro till auktoriteter och systemet. Asien framställs som räddare åt Wall Street. Nyckelord: Retorik, lingvistisk analys, metaforanalys, Eubanks, narrativ analys, Pentden, Burke, diskurs, doxa, Lehman Brothers konkurs, 17 september 2008, Affärsvärlden, Xinhua Finance.

Through a case study about the impact of IT adoption in a residential aged care organisation, this thesis examines the increasing pressure for service integration as mainstreamed through reform policies. Specifically, the research investigates the role of IT in facilitating the 1997 aged care reform agenda of 'ageing in place' focusing on the levels of transformation from the policy context to the organisational/management context, and to the context of service provision by care staff. A single embedded case study (Yin, 1993) is used in order to meet the general objective to capture the dynamics of the impact of ageing in place in the three social contexts. The research is informed by social constructionism, a theoretical framework that emphasises the significance and effects of language in shaping social realities (Ainsworth, 2001; Hosking, 1999). The framework, therefore, justifies the qualitative analysis of both written (i.e., policy documents) and spoken (i.e., interviews with staff) texts to address meaning in relation to context. Changing technologies can result in altered societal structures (Betz, 2003) at all levels, from the very complex to the very basic. As such, it is important to understand a few basic premises of technology. First, technology is a human invention to improve the well-being of society (Ayres, 1996). Consequently, technological inventions that improve the quality of life are seen by people as a necessity for modern living. In the case of ageing, modernisation and technological advances effectively resulted in people becoming healthier and living longer (Department of Health and Aged Care [DHAC], 2000). Second, technology is a human means to control nature (Betz, 2003). As such, technological advances can be seen as a modernising process of predicting and regulating the effects of the trends existing in the environment, such as ageing. Ageing in the twenty first century presents a challenge to government's development policies because ageing is depicted as a steady force with a long-term economic impact (Johnson, 1999). Third, a technology becomes powerful when it is sponsored by the market (Betz, 2003; Hughes, 1983). Unless a technology is backed by business, it lacks the influence on a large scale. Fourth, technology is used to enable change. By using IT, governments, business and the community are co-operating through a paradigm similar to the business sector. As a result, the service environment is shifting towards more business-like approaches. To sustain the changes brought by a different paradigm and modes of operation, the rhetoric of technology is employed. Therefore, the purpose of the study is to investigate the use of IT in processes of organisational adaptations to reform, which requires the examination of: a) specific meaning of IT as used in long-term care policies for older people since the last structural reform, b) the rationale behind the introduction of a new IT system into a residential care organisation, and c) the meaning of IT as articulated by care staff who have experienced a change in technology. The first paper represents a rhetorical analysis at the macro or policy level. There is a significant influence of a global political actor in developing proactive strategies on ageing, which results in a new, multi-organisational approach in delivering government-subsidised services, such as residential care. Three key institutional texts were selected to represent international to local policy development since the time ageing became a global concern. Since then, ageing is also viewed as a human rights issue. Using Burke's pentad, an analytic framework to analyse rhetoric in texts (Stillar, 1998), these institutional texts are seen to employ the rhetoric of 'technology for sustainability' to justify changes to policy approaches that seek long-term viability. Technology, in the name of sustainable development ensures support for economic growth, which balances the long-term effects of population ageing. The existence of a global force, such as population ageing, allows the intervening powers of the UN in mainstreaming ageing into development policies. Accordingly, it initiates corresponding actions at national (Australian Commonwealth Government) and state (Queensland Government) levels. IT is a medium of communication, knowledge transfer, and standard practice at these levels of actions. The second paper represents a qualitative analysis at the meso or organisational level. This paper explores the cogent rationale in the introduction of a computer-based, care documentation system in a large residential aged care organisation. Twenty two staff, from every level of the organisation, were interviewed to get an insight into the role of IT in substantive changes to organisational structure and modes of service provision. Responses from staff indicate external and internal influence that pressured the organisation to change. In the bid to sustain the future of aged care, the industry is changing through the introduction of new structure of service delivery. The Aged Care Structural Reform instigated a shift towards sustainable service provision that is consumer-driven, with a fixed cost compliance mechanism and performance criteria that are tied to funding. Facing the requirement for evidence to corroborate funding, a residential care organisation changed its structure of service delivery by introducing a new strategic direction. IT is part of this new strategic direction, planning, and operations of a changed service environment. The third paper represents a qualitative analysis at the micro or individual level to examine the impact of IT at frontline service delivery. This study is also based on interviews with twenty-two staff, across the organisational structure; however, this time the focus is more on staff who are involved in providing direct care to older residents at the organisation. The reason behind this is that IT has always been a management tool which handles management priorities such as financial planning and performance monitoring. The themes arising from the interviews indicate discord at the level of service delivery from the introduction of a new technical system. It also points to the idea that staff generally refer to ethical ideas and future promise of the new system. In summary, these three papers attached to this thesis support the notion that the meaning of technology is socially constructed. First, technology in the aged care sector has particular reference to improving or enhancing the well-being of older people, and in this case, the provision of high quality services that fulfil the needs of older people. Second, IT has an important role in meeting the evidence-based requirement, such as in the use of information in manipulating the use of resources required for the ageing population. Third, the meaning of IT is conceived from the context requiring its use such as the need to use resource efficiently to ensure long-term sustainability, which were emphasised in the last reform. Fourth, IT is used to enable structural changes in organisations to implement generic practices originated from the business sector, requiring the use of strong rhetoric such as balance and future. The limit of this case study is that these dimensions of technology can only be applied to the specific context of aged care and is not generalisable to other political contexts. However, the strength of the study rests on the macro-, meso- and micro-analysis of the meaning of technology. Therefore, future studies should investigate and compare the dimensions of technology in other contexts.