There are several sessions at the 2008 CCCC’s conference that may be of particular interest to Burkeans. They include:

Whither English? As part of a panel discussing the future of English, John Warnock will discuss the rhetorical history of “English” and Kenneth Burke as a dissenting voice in that history. Session: B.06 on Apr 3, 2008 from 12:15 PM to 1:30 PM

In Latinos/Latinas and the New Rhetorics of Racism, Speaker 4 in the panel will outline theories of the New Racism from the likes of Balibar, Barker, Bonilla-Silva, and Winant, placing the New Racism within a rhetorical framework of the master tropes of Kenneth Burke. Session: C.16 on Apr 3, 2008 from 1:45 PM to 3:00 PM

In a session titled Theories of Metaphor: Aristotle, Burke, Pragmatics, Ethan Sproat will discuss “Irony and Ideation: Rethinking Critical Thinking Dramatistically.” Session: D.17 on Apr 3, 2008 from 3:15 PM to 4:30 PM

The Kenneth Burke Society Special Interest Group will meet on Apr 3, 2008 from 6:30 PM to 7:30 PM

(Re)Charting the (Dis)Courses of Faith and Politics: Kenneth Burke's Pentad, Sharon Crowley's Toward a Civil Discourse , and Barack Obama's "Pentecost 2006" Keynote Address. The panel (Jeffrey M. Ringer, Michael-John DePalma, Jim Webber) will examine conservative Christian and liberal discourses in the public sphere by appealing to Burke's dramatistic pentad and the methods of pentadic analysis proposed by Anderson and Prelli to analyze Crowley's Toward a Civil Discourse and Obama's "Pentecost 2006 Keynote Address." Session: F.03 on Apr 4, 2008 from 8:00 AM to 9:15 AM

In Functions of Theory: Burke, Girard, Sanchez, Heather Branstetter will discuss “Kenneth Burke, Bergsonism, and Negation as Rhetorical Invention.” Session: H.13 on Apr 4, 2008 from 11:00 AM to 12:15 PM

Walking with Sharon Crowley "Toward a Civil Discourse." The panel continues where Crowley's book ends, furthering discussion on the ways narrative, emotion, and myth may provide avenues for traversing binary realities in the public sphere. Ellen Quandahl looks at the issue viz. the interpretive problem which Kenneth Burke began to explore when he described piety as "loyalty to the sources of our being"--a non-religious approach to piety that may usefully extend Crowley's discussion of emotion and invention in a climate of fundamentalism. Session: J.01 on Apr 4, 2008 from 2:00 PM to 3:15 PM