Ronald Reagan on Lebanon and Grenada: Flexibility and interpretation in the application of Kenneth Burke's pentad

Abstract

The pentad is most useful when critics take a flexible approach to the five terms, preserving the inherent ambiguity of act, agent, agency, scene, and purpose. Experimentation with different pentadic root terms will produce different readings of any given text. In most cases, such experimentation will result in the identification of a single term that coordinates a critic's understanding of a text. A pentadic analysis of Ronald Reagan's address of October 27, 1983, on Lebanon and Grenada, demonstrates the critical value of employing multiple pentadic frames. Reagan's speech reveals a formulation of American character incompatible with a thorough multinationalism.