Burkes Contributions to Rhetoric

This paper discusses Kenneth Burkes contributions to rhetoric and its importance as a communicative tool. This paper examines the history of rhetoric and its significance in early Greek and Roman civilizations that coincided with creation of democracy and the importance of public speech. It then shows Kenneth Burkes contribution to the new rhetoric as an argumentative weapon and his influence on the post-modern deconstructionism. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2. Section One: The Preceding Conversation 3. Section Two: Contribution to the Conversation 4. Section Three: Effect on the Conversation 5. Conclusion From the paper: `The word `rhetoric` has an old fashioned air about it. It calls up images of schoolrooms with children in ruffled collars and Latin grammars and not a laptop in sight for several centuries. But rhetoric is as alive as is language itself, and this paper examines the importance of rhetorical studies in helping each of us to become the best writers and speakers ` the best communicators ` that we can be. A historical study of changes models and standards in rhetoric can also provide us not only with a sense of how linguistic and especially English style has changed over the years as well as illuminating how our conception of language and its structure and function have changed as well. This paper engages in such an examination by focusing on the work of Kenneth Burke. We begin with a brief overview of the life of this man whose rhetorical work we will then examine.`