One of the most discussed parts of Kenneth Burke’s work is his “Definition of Man [sic],” a 21 page section in a single book. Putting aside his gender-specific language, it’s one of my “8 Burkean Concepts that are Better than the Pentad.” People have been trying to find an “essential definition” of humans–one that hits our important features and differentiates us from everything else–for centuries.
Appius Claudius Caecus is said to have coined the term Homo Faber (“Man the Maker”), though he was probably just the first to write it down (and have it survive). But apes, beavers, birds and other animals make things and even use tools. Johan Huizinga coined the term Homo Ludens (“the playing man”), but a lot of animals play.
Burke decided to go the more chatty route, and set up five parts to his definition. Let’s run through each of them. “Man [sic] is”:
“The symbol-using, (symbol-making, symbol misusing) animals”
Burke differentiates himself from Caecus in that the tools we use are symbols. We work through symbolic action, a keystone of his notion of Dramatism. This is somewhat in dispute, as many animals have been found to have complex systems of symbols. His example is that a bird can’t tell another bird how to exit a room through a window, but still, whales, porpoises, birds–even prairie dogs can convey sometimes detailed information. And if they didn’t make them themselves…
Burke also argues that we use condensation–we say furniture to mean tables, chairs, couches, beds, etc. But do other animals signal “predator” sometimes, and at other times, “Hawk” or “Wolf?” I don’t know, I’m asking.
Nevertheless, the symbol misusing portion is interesting, animals might do it by mistake; humans might misuse by mistake or by design.
“Inventors of the negative (or moralized by the negative)”
This one might blow your mind. In all likelihood, to any other animal, there is no concept of something being “not-something-else.” My dog might have a concept of her dish not having food in it–presence of a thing versus its absence–but does she think in terms of “Chicken, Brown Rice and Sweet Potato” flavor is NOT “Lamb and Rice” flavor? Does she think, “This couch is NOT the bed?” Can she conceptualize all the possible things that something could be instead–all of the things it is NOT? Burke argues this negation is an offshoot of language use–of symbolic action.
“Separated from their natural condition by instruments of their own making”
So yes, this includes technology, and Burke uses the example of the street lights going out, and everyone freaking out because it’s dark, when, of course it’s dark, it’s night. Nights are naturally dark.
However, it also applies to our symbols. In a conference paper and presentation, I argued that the fact that we coined the term “locavore” shows how far we’ve changed our world. There was a time when eating local food was the only option. Now you have to work hard to find and eat–exclusively–things that are produced close to your home, and we’ve coined a term for the wackos who do that hard work. The symbol change is an effect of the changes in transportation technology and the way we’ve restructured our food system.
But further still, the concept of the symbolic negative has removed us from our natural condition–we can now think and say that “Thou shalt not” do something. That hortatory no is at the same time paradoxical. To say we shouldn’t is to admit we could. This is the problem with all negations and erasures including “cancel culture,” it has to cancel something, so to cancel it, it first must reference it–and that referencing reinforces that the thing came first, the cancellation second–so negation reinforces the primacy of the thing negated. It always becomes, “I could steal, but I shouldn’t.”
“Goaded by the spirit of hierarchy (Or moved by a sense of order)”
Perhaps the most controversial part. Many theorists argue that we like order; putting things in categories is part of the human condition–it makes our lives easier as we invest less brainpower, when we don’t fall prey to oversimplification that leads to problems [racism]. Other theorists argue that we prioritize categories of people based on in-group, party or tribe. However, the idea that we put everything into a hierarchy may not hold true. And it leads to problems in the next part.
“Rotten with perfection”
This one might be culturally biased. Burke says that humans always strive to be better than what they are. A rock or a tree is fine with how it is, a human knows 1) that ze is not perfect, and 2) wants to be. This is problematic, because our notion of perfection can be altered by symbol misuse. Racism provides one problematic example. Beauty standards differ from culture to culture, but many people still strive to fit their culture’s ideal. Further, we strive even in the face of physical limitations. We can’t always be “harder, better, faster, stronger,” Kanye.
So that’s my take on it. Comments? Thoughts? Things I missed?
Source:
Kenneth Burke. “Definition of Man” Language as Symbolic Action 3-24.
