The article It’s All Your Fault, uses stories to explain the issues that impact women’s lives every day about obesity and sexual assault. These issues that women go through are compelling. The survivors of the sexual assault and obesity in the stories are describing the perspectives on the blame and guilt that they have. Kenneth Burke writes about the elements of the drama. Each of the elements serve as lens through which to view the survivors. Kenneth then goes on to express, “reflection of reality .. a selection of reality; and to this extent it must function also as a deflection of reality” (Burke 2). Kenneth Burke is explaining the language of symbolic action and non-symbolic action. Burke uses these to explore the issues between obesity
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The experiences that the women have require blame and require purification. The two ways of achieving restoration are victimage and mortification. Burke defines these as homicidal and suicidal. Victimage is purified vicariously by offering up another. This provides secondhand compensation as an individual transfer the guilt he or she feels to another party. Redemption is achieved through mortification in which involves self-sacrifice or penance for one’s guilt. Mortification is the process of the mental and physical pain on oneself to regain any worthiness. Burke explains mortification as “an extreme form of ‘self-control’” or self-denial” (Burke 3). To put these two together it means that there is no bad guy, there must be a fall guy. Applying this to obesity and sexual assault, acculturation plays a key role in determining the control one considers mortifying, as well as the one who presumes the control. The forms of victimage and mortification are exchanged by individuals within their cultures and can be initiated within or outside of the individual. Within the Western culture, the attitude becomes critical deciding between symbolic and non-symbolic as causes between victimage and mortification responses. Burke calls attitude, “incipient action” (Burke 4) which can be expressed before, during, and after an act through language, vocal expression, and bodily posture. Attitude is like a balance beam between symbolic action and
The experiences that the women have require blame and require purification. The two ways of achieving restoration are victimage and mortification. Burke defines these as homicidal and suicidal. Victimage is purified vicariously by offering up another. This provides secondhand compensation as an individual transfer the guilt he or she feels to another party. Redemption is achieved through mortification in which involves self-sacrifice or penance for one’s guilt. Mortification is the process of the mental and physical pain on oneself to regain any worthiness. Burke explains mortification as “an extreme form of ‘self-control’” or self-denial” (Burke 3). To put these two together it means that there is no bad guy, there must be a fall guy. Applying this to obesity and sexual assault, acculturation plays a key role in determining the control one considers mortifying, as well as the one who presumes the control. The forms of victimage and mortification are exchanged by individuals within their cultures and can be initiated within or outside of the individual. Within the Western culture, the attitude becomes critical deciding between symbolic and non-symbolic as causes between victimage and mortification responses. Burke calls attitude, “incipient action” (Burke 4) which can be expressed before, during, and after an act through language, vocal expression, and bodily posture. Attitude is like a balance beam between symbolic action and