Burke, War, Words: Rhetoricizing Dramatism( Series - Studies In Rhetoric/communication )

Weiser reinserts Kenneth Burkes theory of dramatism into the social milieu from which it originated, fostering a new interpretation of how this concept of motivation was itself motivated by particular circumstances. Central to Burkes germinal volume A Grammar of Motives, dramatism was a direct response to World War II and to then-ongoing debates with the New Critics, social scientists, linguists, and government propagandists over the role of language in affecting the world. Weiser contends that Burke conceived dramatism as an alternative to New Criticism and as a blueprint for resolution of conflicts through a dialectical response to the monologue of fascism. Weiser draws from published and unpublished communications between Burke and the diverse literati of his era as well as from Burkes scholarly, political, and poetic writings of the time. Establishing the origins of dramatism offers a renewal of purpose in the theory as an action-oriented tool for engaging intellectuals in our conflicted age as Burke had envisioned in his.