Perception Is Key~ Gender & Erroneous Icons

Kenneth Burke, (for simplicity’s sake I will refer to all of the Burkean personalities as one singular individual) has become an iconic representation of rhetoric. Burke’s theories are wrapped in societal discourse and generational commentary- all of which seems to point to the totalizing failures of human society. Yet invaluable though Burkes theories are, they are often applied to the Caucasian, able-bodied, Anglo man. I in no way mean to implicate Burke as single minded or ignorant of the plight of those non-white/able-bodied men, I only mean to draw attention to the unintentionally targeted public of Burkes theory. Helen Keller is equally, if not disproportionately iconic in name, yet nearly obscure in theory. From adverse beginnings Keller developed into one of the great, yet unrecognized rhetors of her time. Ann George in her essay, Kenneth Burke Meet Helen Keller, attempts to draw parallels between these unlikely like-minded rhetors. “Reading Keller side by side with Burke underscores the extent to which Keller was not simply doing rhetoric; she was living and writing rhetorical theory- theory that often predates Burkes and rivals it sophistication” (George 340). Gender, race, disability and social situation each contains its own discourse, but how does this discourse effect the lens through which individuals perceive the world and understand it in terms of language?  The importance to be noted here is the similarity of Burke and Keller’s theory and the divergence in public perception.

                  Judith Butler in her essay, Gender Trouble, writers that there is at present a problem of “subject” in terms of feminist politics. The question of the subject is crucial for politics, and for feminist politics in particular, because juridical subject are invariable produced though certain exclusionary practices that do not show once the juridical structure of politics has been established” (Butler 3). The question of subject in law is akin to that of language in society, in order to define Butlers feminist subject it is first essential to decide what is meant by feminism and feminist politics. Do these terms appropriately describe the content they represent or are they terms that have become colloquially bastardized?

                  To answer the above question lets reevaluate the theoretical parallels and demographic divergences between Burke and Keller. Burke and Keller could not have been more different in terms of experience and the way they navigated the world. Keller came to the same or similar conclusions as Burke about the blindness of humans through her physical lack of sight and disconnection from the substantial world. She understood the constraints of the human race on a visceral level because she was trapped in her body the way individuals are trapped in society. However her radical political intentions were overshadowed by the perception that was forced upon her by those who viewed her the way they wanted to based on her physical conditions as a handicapped woman. “As a radical woman constrained by her saintly public persona, Keller understood the power of cultural pieties to blind people to alternative perspectives; as a politically minded citizen, she defended her ability to make informed judgments as well as the sighted, explaining that she learned about things as they do- not firsthand, but through texts” (George 340).  

Keller used her butchered identity as a platform, a means for advancing her ideas. She posited that she was at no disadvantage for not having the facility of sight of hearing because we all only experience the world as we understand it, no one lives anything firsthand except their own experiences, which they can never duplicate or truly convey to anyone outside of themselves. Keller maintained that all humans were blind and until they realized that they were slaves to their circumstance. “We cannot be free until we know the nature of our bondage and examine the chains that bind us” (blind Leaders 60 qtd George 342). Similarly Burke is famous for claiming that humans are oblivious to their own servitude. “Burke uses the concepts of trained incapacity and piety to account for people’s resistance to change. He argues that Americans have become so well trained in established cultural values that they are incapable of recognizing these pieties as either a cause of their problems of something that might be changed to solve them” (Burke 343). Both Burke and Keller arrived at similar conclusions about society and signification by drastically different means. Because of Keller’s unique personal situation she could almost be considered what Burke would refer to as an ideal rhetor. For being without the ability to discern sound or appearance she is unusually without influence from the physical world outside herself.

The dialog George creates between Keller and Burke works alongside Butler’s ideas about language and identification. Keller represents Burkes idealized “enlightened and uninfluenced” individual. She has no concept of terministic screens or any somatic construction of gender; in terms of physicality- she is the summation of her own mind and the works she has read. Keller knew the restrictions of her gender and handicap because she lived them and perceived the worlds projections but she was not able herself to develop these biases, she did not see the world through a series of lenses based on who she was and how she thought. She saw that world- as close to objectively as possible, yet she was just as trapped by stigma as anyone else in terms of perception. As invaluable as she was as a theorist, a feminist and a radical leftist, she will be remembered as the saintly cripple who overcame adversity. Because that is how we have chosen to see her.

~Mikaela McShane