Kyle Jensen

Forthcoming from the MIT Press

Since its publication in 1950, Kenneth Burke’s A Rhetoric of Motives has been one of the most influential texts of theory and criticism. Critics have discovered in its pages concepts that reveal new dimensions of human motivation. And yet, despite its obvious genius, critics have interpreted A Rhetoric of Motives as a collection of provocations rather than a systematic treatment of rhetoric.In this book, Kyle Jensen argues that the coherence in Burke’s thought has yet to be fully appreciated. Drawing on unpublished drafts and voluminous correspondence, he reconstructs Burke’s drafting and revision process for A Rhetoric of Motives as well as its recently discovered second volume, The War of Words. Jensen’s extensive archival analysis reveals that Burke relied on the concept of myth to draw together the loose ends in his argument. For Burke, all general theories of rhetoric are formed and structured using mythic images and terms.By exploring what Burke added and omitted, and by putting his writing process into the context of daily life after the Second World War—including Burke’s attempts to clear the weeds from his Andover farm—Jensen sheds new light on the key problems that Burke encountered and the methods he used to overcome them. Kenneth Burke’s Weed Garden is essential for those who study Burke and the tradition of modern rhetoric that he helped found.

Since its publication in 1950, Kenneth Burke’s A Rhetoric of Motives has been one of the most influential texts of theory and criticism. Critics have discovered in its pages concepts that reveal new dimensions of human motivation. And yet, despite its obvious genius, critics have interpreted A Rhetoric of Motives as a collection of provocations rather than a systematic treatment of rhetoric.In this book, Kyle Jensen argues that the coherence in Burke’s thought has yet to be fully appreciated. Drawing on unpublished drafts and voluminous correspondence, he reconstructs Burke’s drafting and revision process for A Rhetoric of Motives as well as its recently discovered second volume, The War of Words. Jensen’s extensive archival analysis reveals that Burke relied on the concept of myth to draw together the loose ends in his argument. For Burke, all general theories of rhetoric are formed and structured using mythic images and terms.By exploring what Burke added and omitted, and by putting his writing process into the context of daily life after the Second World War—including Burke’s attempts to clear the weeds from his Andover farm—Jensen sheds new light on the key problems that Burke encountered and the methods he used to overcome them. Kenneth Burke’s Weed Garden is essential for those who study Burke and the tradition of modern rhetoric that he helped found.

Studies in Rhetorics and FeminismsEdited by Cheryl Glenn and Shirley Wilson LoganRHETORICAL LISTENING IN ACTION: A CONCEPT-TACTIC APPROACH aims to cultivate writers who can listen across differences in preparation for thinking critically, communicating, and acting across those differences. Krista Ratcliffe and Kyle Jensen offer a rhetorical education centered on rhetorical listening as it inflects other rhetorical concepts, such as agency, rhetorical situation, identification, myth, and rhetorical devices. RHETORICAL LISTENING IN ACTION spans classical and contemporary rhetoric, reading key concepts through rhetorical listening and supported by scholarship in rhetoric and composition, feminist studies, critical race studies, and intersectionality theory. The book expands on how we think about and negotiate difference and the factors that mediate social relations and competing cultural logics. Along the way, Ratcliffe and Jensen associate creative and heuristic tactics with clearly defined concepts to give all writers methods for listening rhetorically to and understanding alternative viewpoints.For writers new to the concepts of rhetorical listening, four appendices show how these concepts illuminate rhetoric, language, discourse, argument, writing processes, research, and style. KRISTA RATCLIFFE is Foundation Professor and Chair in the Department of English at Arizona State University. Her research focuses on intersections of rhetoric, feminist theory, and critical race studies. Her book Rhetorical Listening: Identification, Gender, Whiteness (2006) won the 2007 CCCC Outstanding Book Award, and the 2007 Rhetoric Society of America Book Award. She has served as President of the Rhetoric Society of America and the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition. She is a Fellow of the Rhetoric Society of America. KYLE JENSEN is Professor of English and Director of Writing Programs at Arizona State University. He is the author or co-editor of five previous books, including Reimagining Process: Online Writing Archives and the Future of Writing Studies (2015), The War of Words by Kenneth Burke (2018), and Kenneth Burke's Weed Garden: Refiguring the Grounds of Modern Rhetoric (2022).

Studies in Rhetorics and FeminismsEdited by Cheryl Glenn and Shirley Wilson LoganRHETORICAL LISTENING IN ACTION: A CONCEPT-TACTIC APPROACH aims to cultivate writers who can listen across differences in preparation for thinking critically, communicating, and acting across those differences. Krista Ratcliffe and Kyle Jensen offer a rhetorical education centered on rhetorical listening as it inflects other rhetorical concepts, such as agency, rhetorical situation, identification, myth, and rhetorical devices. RHETORICAL LISTENING IN ACTION spans classical and contemporary rhetoric, reading key concepts through rhetorical listening and supported by scholarship in rhetoric and composition, feminist studies, critical race studies, and intersectionality theory. The book expands on how we think about and negotiate difference and the factors that mediate social relations and competing cultural logics. Along the way, Ratcliffe and Jensen associate creative and heuristic tactics with clearly defined concepts to give all writers methods for listening rhetorically to and understanding alternative viewpoints.For writers new to the concepts of rhetorical listening, four appendices show how these concepts illuminate rhetoric, language, discourse, argument, writing processes, research, and style. KRISTA RATCLIFFE is Foundation Professor and Chair in the Department of English at Arizona State University. Her research focuses on intersections of rhetoric, feminist theory, and critical race studies. Her book Rhetorical Listening: Identification, Gender, Whiteness (2006) won the 2007 CCCC Outstanding Book Award, and the 2007 Rhetoric Society of America Book Award. She has served as President of the Rhetoric Society of America and the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition. She is a Fellow of the Rhetoric Society of America. KYLE JENSEN is Professor of English and Director of Writing Programs at Arizona State University. He is the author or co-editor of five previous books, including Reimagining Process: Online Writing Archives and the Future of Writing Studies (2015), The War of Words by Kenneth Burke (2018), and Kenneth Burke's Weed Garden: Refiguring the Grounds of Modern Rhetoric (2022).

Collection of essays that draws on the concept of abductive logic, originally introduced by Charles Sanders Peirce, to imagine new areas of writing studies research.

For more than four decades, the dominant model for pedagogy and research in the field of composition has been a how-centered process approach to writing instruction, which involves studying the writing that students produce to expose the various stages of their writing process. By looking at notes, outlines, and multiple drafts, often presented by students together in the form of a portfolio, instructors can identify unproductive habits that students may have and provide techniques that help them improve their writing. In this groundbreaking volume, Kyle Jensen critiques traditional how-centered process instruction and presents a sound, practical methodology by which portfolios and online writing archives—digital interfaces that expose the marks of revision writers make during composition—might be employed to develop theories about what writing is: how it occurs, functions, circulates, creates meaning, and forms its subjects. Offering online writing archives as a way to envision a transdisciplinary approach to writing studies, Reimagining Process does not abandon the prevailing concepts of process pedagogy but rather casts them in wider contexts to conceive new ways of teaching and studying writing.

Centuries ago the daughter of the first vampire was murdered. Now walking in our world, making friends with creatures of the night, she seeks her revenge.