Abstract

The purpose of this study is to judge whether Kenneth Burke's notions and critical methods are ethnocentrically Western. It employs the Laozi and Zhuangzi texts of Chinese Daoist philosophy to determine whether Burke's view of language and his approaches to criticism admit a non-Western point of view. Ethnocentrism is defined as a limitation in an individual's "way of seeing"--of perceiving, evaluating, and responding to the world--according to enculturation in a specific ingroup. Burke's sphere of cultural learning is defined as that of a traditional, dominant, Euroamerican ingroup of the West. Daoism is shown to be representative of a non-Western culture influential in the Sino-centered region of the Far East. The Daoist texts serve to expand and systematize the author's experience in this cultural milieu. They also provide a coherent representation of a view of language and guides to conduct and are, thus, comparable in content to the works of Kenneth Burke. ;The comparison of Daoist and Burkeian works reveals various parallels among elements salient in the two sets of texts. Both offer a view of symbols as a source of partial perspectives which serve to ascertain how people should act. Both provide similar alternative standpoints on language--the Dao Axis and Dramatistic perspective--which emphasize the doubt gained as we perceive the operations of linguistic ambiguity. Both develop practical realizations of these views of language. The Daoists' Dao as a guide to social conduct and Burke's critical methods of planned incongruity, cluster analysis, and pentadic analysis appear comparable in that they foster awareness by freeing their users from limited and limiting symbol-bound perspectives. ;The study concludes that Burke's works admit the non-Western way of seeing represented by the Daoist texts. To this extent, they may not be deemed ethnocentric. Implications of this Eastern interpretation of Burke's works are discussed in relation to the field of rhetorical studies. It is argued that both Burke's view of language and his critical methods are relevant to the analysis of texts that cross cultural boundaries, and for assessing the cultural limitations of the speech discipline's own rhetorical products