Burke's Pentad

Burke, the author of Definition of Man, uses five terms, called the “dramatistic pentad,” to think about language. Treating language as a vehicle for action rather than information allows him to determine human motivation using the pentad.
The terms correspond to basic interrogatives. Act: what does the person do? To qualify as an act it must have intent behind it. Agent: who performs the act? This can be a larger social group. Agency: how is the act performed? Scene: when and where is the act performed? This also includes circumstances. Purpose: Why was the act committed? This is not the motive that Burke is looking for. Burke also struggled with the concept of attitude and considered using it to form a sixth domain but instead placed it within the scope of the agent.
Burke claims the motive can only be discovered by examining each term and its relationship with the remaining terms. This makes ten possible combinations of terms. Each combination should be viewed as a ratio. The ratio has two possible sequences; for example, act and agency can be thought of as act/agency or as agency/act. The analyst would consider first how act can influence agency. Then the analyst switches the ratio and examines how, for instance, the agency can ifluence the act. This system allows us to consider one rhetorical act from 20 different angles. Analysis may lead to the conclusion that one term disproportionately influences the other terms. Then the interpreter can frame the motivation as being attributed primarily to that term. So we can see how purpose differs from motivation. Although the agent always has a purpose, our analysis may reveal that the act was primarily motivated by the scene, act, agency, or agent.
The pentad is a result of Burke’s thinking about language as being motivated rather than simply animated. To be animated, like animals and clocks, requires motion. Human action also requires motion, but to qualify as action it must also be imbued with purpose. Burke is not comfortable with reducing symbolic action to mere motion and uses the dramatistic pentad to illustrate whatever drives the rhetoric.

Fisher's Narrative Paradigm

Walter Fisher contends that “Narration as a Human Communication Paradigm” merits attention because it demonstrates that rhetoric does not have to conform to traditional conceptions of argument developed by those educated in a “rational world paradigm.” For Fisher, narratives include any speech or act that has “sequence and meaning” for the speaker/actor or someone who interprets the behavior. Fisher says that for narrative to be accepted it must compete with rationality. But he also views the rational world paradigm as falling under the domain of narrative paradigm. Here lies the tension within the paper. If rationality is part of narrative then any victory for rationality should be a victory for narrative. Fisher wants to say that all communication is narrative and he also leads the reader to believe that rationality, though perceived as superior is an inferior form of narrative. His research of the nuclear war controversy led him to believe that rationality has failed to resolve the issues but a narrative paradigm could be a solution. However, Fisher does not adequately explain the other forms of narrative that might be superior to rationality. So he attempts to remove rationality, or at least set it back, but he is not advancing anything new to replace it because everything is already narrative. Actually, his failure to provide specific alternatives to rationality is consistent with his view that the narrative paradigm does not require any expertise to recognize or articulate. Fisher, according to Fisher, cannot claim to have expert knowledge beyond the average person. But then we should also ask why Fisher has to write an essay to explain something to us that we already have knowledge of. One possibility is that he is simply reminding us not to try and advance beyond narrative applications of communication. But if rationality was ineffective, would we need people like Fisher to point that out? No it should be obvious that logic is ineffective.

Original Story

I had started my story a couple weeks ago and went to the gym thinking about it. While at the gym I developed and had some good ideas and an outline of how I wanted to do the story. But when I came back from the gym I never wrote down my ideas. So as I sat down to finish my story I could not remember what I wanted to say next although the theme I could remember.
So basically I had to continue the story again and think of how it could go. I finished it and discovered that my theme changed although one illustration remained the same.
Now I just have to practice it and remember it.
Actually, I guess we can have it written down right?
I read it to my girlfriend. My goal is to practice it once a day at least until thursday.

Competing Narratives

Different people attribute different underlying causes to phenomena. Bad things happen to people. Some people will explain this as due to a personal weakness or decision. Others believe it results from not following the will of God.
both explanations involve telling a story about how such a circumstance occured. Both also draw from wider more generic narratives to explain the specific narrative.
I found myself arguing with someone, not for a particular narrative but simply to promote the idea that even though we may not want one explanation to be true and really think that another narrative is more likely correct, neither narrative is wrong when viewed from the perspective that produced it.
When a person always draws from the same major narrative (religion) to explain minor narratives (why bad things happen) I understand that it can get a little tedious.
But I think we should consider that within the belief of the religious narrative it is considered honorable to continuously draw from that narrative. And to ask someone to explain it differently is like asking them to tear out a piece of who they are.
It seems like the very people who want everyone to consider that there are other explanations for phenomena other than religion hold onto their favorite narrative as dogmatically as the religious people. Its probably too much to ask that people consider the chance that the other side may be correct or that no one has sufficient answers. But I do think we should find reasons to give some small credit to other narratives. We should find something honorable within the other narrative. That is not to say that we should not criticize. But if we add some salt to our criticism it will make it more palatable. Salt is the part of it that we can honor. We don't even have to give it the highest honor, just a small pinch could make a world of difference.

All decisions are based on narrative.
What about quick decisions?
Or ones made based on memory?

The polar bear story shows gender bias.



narrative
rational
authoritarian traditional

This is the second time I have lost this post.
I suggest composing it in a text document and pasting it here later.
I'm telling a story about how I have done a lot of work on this post, but have nothing to show for it.

Facebook

I signed up for facebook the other day.
My girlfriend Julia said I should join because one of her friends wanted to message me.
All of a sudden a crowd of people were inviting me to join their network.
wow the pressure.
Will someone be upset if I don't add them as a friend.
Will I eventually feel like I have too many friends, and feel like I need to disconnect from a few.
Will they take it personally.
So people can go to my profile and add pictures or say things that will be available to everyone.
It's way too open for me.
I can't describe how traumatic it all is.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. I was inspired to do it because blogging for this class has been stimulating and I thought maybe facebook will be similar.
We'll see how it goes.

Ice-fishing

When we retold the story in class from someone else, we insert a moral into it. For our final story we have to do the same thing, make it "intentional."
I was thinking of talking about ice-fishing from when I was a kid.
But now that I have to make it intentional, it seems trickier. I was just thinking of informative, because I figure alot of people from CA don't know quite what ice-fishing is.
In English class and speech class, it's common to do informative and then persuasive. Not that I need to "persuade" in the story, but at least have a stronger purpose.
What to do?
theme
goal
intent
purpose