The Rhetoric of Redemption: Kenneth Burke's Redemption Drama and Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" SpeechRowman & Littlefield, 2004 - 141 pages Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech has become an icon of American public culture, its imagery and words profoundly influencing the civil rights debate. In The Rhetoric of Redemption Bobbitt applies Kenneth Burke's theory of guilt-purification-redemption in a close, critical analysis of the speech, developing and examining the implications of Burke's redemption drama in contemporary public discourse. He studies the impact of the speech over time, arguing that, while King's speech contains an inspirational vision of national redemption, it does so by omitting the real difficulties of overcoming America's racial divisions. |
Contents
Context and Critical Methodologies | 1 |
Agent and Scene | 11 |
Act The Redemption of the Audiences Guilt | 27 |
Purification and Redemption | 41 |
Metaphoric Analysis | 63 |
Evaluation of the Theory of GuiltPurificationRedemption | 87 |
Evaluation of I Have a Dream and Its Legacy | 101 |
Conclusion | 123 |
| 127 | |
| 137 | |
About the Author | |
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Common terms and phrases
achieve action African Americans American dream analysis argues assimilationist audience auditor Birmingham Birmingham campaign black guilt black power advocates Burke Burke's theory Burkean chapter check/promissory note civil rights movement comic frame concept context culture demonstrate dramatic catharsis emphases emphasis in original equality evil Garrow goal god-term hierarchy human ideas imagery images of change implies Judeo-Christian justice Kenneth Burke King's Dream King's metaphors King's rhetoric King's speech language M. L. King March on Washington Martin Luther King meaning message/form metaphoric clusters modes of purification moral mortification mythology myths nation National Urban League Negro nonviolence ontological oppression pentadic perspective political polysemy race relations racial injustice racism Randolph redeem redemption drama religious representative anecdote rhetorical critics Ricoeur role Rueckert second persona secular segregation social order society sociopolitical spiritual struggle supernatural realm synecdochal theory of metaphor tion transcendence vehicle victim victimage and mortification white America white guilt words