My overall assessment is that Jennifer MacLennan's essay on crime-scene analysis as viewed in the light of Burke's dramatism makes for a rich, detailed, and generally convincing analogue. Obviously, if Burke's take on human symbolic action has validity, a dramatistic critic can dig up spadefuls of drama in any set of discourses. As she makes clear, though, MacLennan explores not just the way the pentad-related "who, what, when, where, and why questions" pervade the how-to-do-it books of the sleuths who solve serial murders. She unveils "deeper connections" and similarities. Both John Douglas and Robert Ressler, her primary guides in the hunt for what are superficially thought to be motiveless killings, have "assembled . . . a grammar of the symbolic elements of violent crime," a "language of the crime scene," that mirrors many of Burke's primary insights.
Save the dates! KB in Ghent, "Rhetoric in a Precarious World"
Rhetoric in a Precarious World. Moving forward with and from Kenneth Burke
In partnership with the Rhetoric Society of Europe, the Kenneth Burke Society will return to Ghent University July 1–3, 2026! In this conference, we aim to explore how the study of rhetoric can respond to and engage with the contentious dynamics our our times, moving forward both with and from KB.