Communication As Action: Discourse Analysis From The Perspective Of Burkean New Rhetoric

This Ph.D. dissertation is intended to provide a comprehensive introduction to a relatively new approach to discourse analysis, i.e. the model of discourse analysis from the perspective of Burkean new rhetoric. The focus of the research is upon the construction and implementation of the model. Our data consists of naturally occurring discourses and texts in various situations from a variety of genres.Discourse analysis, as a study of language use beyond the sentence boundary, has been an increasingly popular and important area of study. Arising out of a variety of disciplines, including linguistics, sociology, psychology and anthropology, discourse analysis has developed into a variety of approaches motivated by a wide range of interests and orientations. Deborah Schiffrin in Approaches to Discourse introduces six different ways to do discourse analysis: speech act theory, interactional sociolinguistics, ethnography of communication, pragmatics, conversation analysis and variation analysis. There are some other approaches such as the systemic-functional approach, the critical linguistics approach, the cognitive approach, the literary approach and so on. There is such a vast range of approaches to discourse analysis. Yet, up to now, to my limited knowledge, there hasn't been any attempt to do discourse analysis systematically from the perspective of Burkean new rhetoric, although rhetoric, a long-established tradition of communication since the days of ancient Greece, is widely claimed as the origin of discourse study. New rhetoric has been largely neglected in discourse analysis and text linguistics. This is why we single out the subject for discussion in this dissertation. The approach is based on the theory of new rhetoric, which has classical rhetoric as its root and was vastly expanded in its domain and scope of study in the twentieth century. While constructing the model of discourse analysis, we especially refer to the theory of Kenneth Burke, as he is widely acknowledged as the most eminent representative of new rhetoric. We build a model according to his theory of rhetoric and put our model into practice by providing extended analysis of various types of discourse, and reflect on this analytical tool in terms of its theoretical and pedagogical implications. Our critical practices demonstrate that our model is applicable to the study of discourse, at least to the study of some types of text and to some extent. By proposing our approach, we do not assume that other approaches to discourse analysis are inadequate. What we want to do is to outline a framework for the critical analysis of discourses from a perspective that has been seldom touched by other scholars. Since it is from another perspective, it may solve problems that haven't been discovered by other approaches. The present study therefore aims at demonstrating the interdisciplinary nature of new rhetoric and equipping the discourse analyst with the tool to unravel the mysteries of the artifact under consideration and to analyze the ways in which language systems describe and influence human motives. By introducing the Burkean approach, we hope to contribute to the conversation about the nature and function of rhetoric, to open up new possibilities for the study of discourse, to add to the conversation about discourse analysis, and to enlarge its vastness.The opening Chapter situates the work as a contribution to the study of discourse and formulates a set of aims and objectives for the research. The data and methodology for the present study are stated, too. The final part of Chapter One is to give an overview of the whole organization and structure of the thesis. Chapter Two briefly reviews previous literature on discourse analysis as well as relevant approaches to discourse study. Following the literature review is the statement of the present approach, in which we explain the aim and focus of study of our approach and how we try to be different from former approaches.Chapter Three sketches theoretical points tha...