Burke’s readings were particularly interesting to me, both because he examined things like “the rhetoric of witchcraft” and Darwinism and Biblical rhetoric and because of his concept of terministic screens.  While I’m still not entirely sure that I got everything he intended me to get out of it, I enjoyed the fact that he identified the ideas of continuity and discontinuity in Darwinism versus the theologian approach.  That section made a lot of sense to me.

Overall, it felt like Burke was starting a revival in rhetoric, one that was more relevant to the current time (but probably still at least ten years ago).  The thing that interested me most was actually the hymn he included at the end– is that a real hymn or did he create it?  Regardless, I found it very entertaining that he managed to find an example that was rhetorical at heart but given in the manner of theology that he had been discussing earlier.  It feels like that could be a clever way to gain support for the cause of a rhetorical revival– using theology to persuade more religious readers of the benefits of rhetoric.

While I liked several points of Burke’s, I’m looking forward to the class discussion– I feel like I need some explanation this week.