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Kenneth Burke

ケネス・デューヴァ・バーク

Kenneth Burke

Profile

Gender
Male
Born
1897-05-05 （Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.）
Died
1993-11-19 （Andover, New Jersey, U.S.） age 96
Nationality
United States
Languages
English
Religion
Agnosticism (later)
Residence History
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (birth) → Weehawken, New Jersey → Greenwich Village, New York City → Andover, New Jersey (later life)

Career

Occupations
literary theorist, poet, essayist, novelist, philosopher, critic, music critic
Active Years
1915-1993
Affiliations
University of Chicago (teaching/lecturing), Bennington College (teaching/lecturing), Editor and music critic at The Dial, Music critic for The Nation (1934–1936)
Influenced By
Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Friedrich Nietzsche, Thorstein Veblen, Aristotle, Shakespeare, Thomas Mann, André Gide
Influenced
Harold Bloom, Susan Sontag, Stanley Cavell, Edward Said, René Girard, J. Hillis Miller, Erving Goffman

Education

Peabody High School
Period: 高校卒業年不明
Country: United States
Befriended Malcolm Cowley and others at school
Ohio State University
Studied courses in French, German, Greek and Latin
Period: 入学年不明 - 期間不明
Country: United States
No clear record of degree completion
Columbia University
Member of the Boar's Head Society
Period: 中途退学（学位未取得）
Country: United States
Left Columbia without receiving a degree

Awards

Dial Award
1928
Organization: The Dial (magazine)
Result: 受賞
Guggenheim Fellowship
1935
Organization: John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Result: 受賞（フェローシップ）
National Medal for Literature (American Book Awards)
1981
Organization: American Book Awards
Result: 受賞

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

A Grammar of Motives

1945 rhetoric / philosophy / criticism

A major work analyzing motives through a dramatistic perspective; introduces the dramatistic pentad (act, scene, agent, agency, purpose).

symbolsmotivesdramatismsocial cooperation and conflict

A Rhetoric of Motives

1950 rhetoric / criticism

Develops theory of identification and explores how rhetoric shapes human relations and persuasion.

identificationpersuasionsocial identity

Language as Symbolic Action

1966 essays / criticism

Collection including 'Definition of Man'; discusses political and cognitive roles of language and symbols.

symbolic actionselection and reflection of reality (terministic screens)

Counter-Statement

1931 literary criticism / essays

Early collection of criticism showing Burke's critical perspective and style.

criticismengagement with modernist literature

Permanence and Change

1935 criticism / philosophy

Discusses relationships between social/cultural change and permanence.

changepermanencesocial criticism

Bibliography

  • Counter-Statement (1931)
  • Permanence and Change (1935)
  • A Grammar of Motives (1945)
  • A Rhetoric of Motives (1950)
  • Language as Symbolic Action (1966)
  • Collected Poems 1915–1967 (1968)
  • Late Poems: 1968–1993 (2005, posthumous)
  • Here & Elsewhere: The Collected Fiction of Kenneth Burke (2005)

Adaptations

  • 'One Light in a Dark Valley' — Burke wrote the song; recorded by his grandson Harry Chapin

Style & Themes

Literary Style
scholarly, theoretical proseemphasis on rhetorical and philosophical argumentationtendency to treat concepts in a poetical manner
Recurring Motifs
symbols and symbolic actionguilt, purification, and redemption cycledramatic metaphor (dramatism)identification and identity

Health

  • heart failure (cause of death)
    1993年晩年
    Recorded as cause of death

Legacy

Burke profoundly influenced 20th-century American rhetoric and literary theory. Through works such as A Grammar of Motives and A Rhetoric of Motives he introduced dramatism, symbolic action, and identification, which continue to be debated in rhetoric, criticism, and social theory. His papers are archived at Pennsylvania State University, and scholarly activity continues via the Kenneth Burke Society and KB Journal.

Academic Societies

  • Kenneth Burke Society
  • KB Journal (scholarly journal)

Archives

  • Pennsylvania State University Special Collections (Kenneth Burke Papers)

In Popular Culture

  • His grandson Harry Chapin recorded a song written by Burke, creating a popular-culture connection

Quotes

  • Man is the symbol-using, symbol-making, and symbol-misusing animal; inventor of the negative, separated from his natural condition by instruments of his own making, goaded by the spirit of hierarchy, and rotten with perfection.
    Source: "Definition of Man", Language as Symbolic Action (1966) (1966)

Trivia

  • Burke's first English translation of Thomas Mann's 'Death in Venice' appeared in The Dial in 1924.
  • His grandson Harry Chapin recorded a song written by Burke.
  • He left Columbia University without a degree and was largely an autodidact.
  • He received the National Medal for Literature in 1981.