Our hero the buffoon: Contradictory and concurrent Burkean framing of Arizona Governor Evan...

IN Attitudes Toward History Kenneth Burke details the ways in which history may be socially constructed through poetic frames that accept or reject a given social order. The decision to depict the players in history as heroes, villains, clowns, or buffoons represents the choice to accept or reject the status quo in part or sum. The Burkean tradition in communication has been disposed to recognize Burke's poetic frames as existing in isolation of one another. Examples of well-esteemed scholarship taking such an approach can be seen in Denise Bostdorffs familiar analysis of political cartoons, using the burlesque lens, to reject the policies of Secretary James Watt. Cheree Carlson demonstrated Mohandas Gandhi's use of the comic perspective as part of nonviolent resistance ("Gandhi"). Edward Appel discussed William F. Buckley, Jr.'s use of burlesque in ridiculing his opponents ("Burlesque") and Adrienne Christiansen and Jeremy Hanson presented ACT UP's use of the comic frame as a call for change in the midst of great tragedy. Most recently, Bryan Hubbard used the burlesque frame for a revisionist approach to President Truman's decision to use the atomic bomb. These analyses is highly respectable pieces of research, yet they each demonstrate the reaction to a conflict as patterned after a single frame.