Kenneth Burke Blog One

Blog One: Permanence and Change, “Orientations.”

Orientation is thus a bundle of judgments as to how things were, how they are, and how they may be. The act of response, as implicated in the character, which an event has for us, shows clearly the integral relationship between our metaphysics and our conduct. For in a statement as to how the world is, we have implicit judgments not only as to how the world may become but also as to what means we should employ to make it so. 14


Immediately, upon reading this portion of the text, I was drawn to Burke’s notion of, “Orientations.” After reading Sara Ahmed’s work on, “queer phenomenology and orientations,”(145) I see both Burke and Ahmed’s explanations of orientations as connected in intimate and important ways. Our orientations situate us in the world, and if we are oriented towards one thing, we are often oriented away from something else. Ahmed explains this through the metaphor of a compass; if we are turned north, we turned way from facing south (Ahmed 145.) Not to diverge too much from the topic, but Ahmed extends this metaphor to the concept of sexuality, saying we turn towards some love/sexual partners, while simultaneously turning our back to other possibilities. She claims that it is this process that reproduces heteronormativity.
While in a different context, I think Burke is making a similar claim: We make judgments about the world; these judgments are distinct and pull us in certain directions, while pulling us away from others ways of thinking and being in the world. Thus, our orientations are interpretive responses to certain events, or patterns. Our orientations are socially mandated, although not necessarily prescriptive. We find people, thoughts, and “machines,” to identify with, often based on our previous experiences. He explains this through the “chicken” metaphor. My yoga teacher described it this evening as the circular way we move through the world. She explained that when we come to our yoga mats, we disrupt the circular momentum in which we live. I think yoga has the power to reorient us to the world in different ways every time we come to the mat, experience that moment; we may be able to reenter the circular pattern differently. We may be able to approach a negative situation more positively, confront marginalization and injustice, and actually work towards liberation.
As Burke says, “Whenever there is an unsatisfactory situation, men will naturally desire to avoid it”(9). But how do we classify an “unsatisfactory situation?” Orientations, to Burke, often seem to be grounded in a religious, specifically, Christian context and moralistic structure. Gravitating towards a moral structure/conduct that emphasizes values such as, the Ten Commandments, guides experience, expectations, and choices. An orientation towards this sort of moral structure can collapse the possibility for other worldviews to exist/coexist with it. So often we hear that we fear the unknown, so we turn away from it and cast judgment. But in many ways, even this phrase is an orientation that in its utterance allows for an orientation of divisiveness.
However, according to Burke orientations are not fixed entities, however we do often become enmeshed in them so deeply that they are naturalized. Sometimes these orientations are harmful to one and to others who do not fit the order. But we are not simply doomed. We learn from experience, we make sense of the world through what we identify with; we orient ourselves to the world and others in specific ways. Like Ahmed, I wonder how orientations, especially in terms of sexual orientations, can draw us together or separate us. How do our identifications with one individual or group suddenly define us, and if we do not identify that way we become exiled from that group. For example, if my orientation is towards someone of the opposite sex, there is an assumption that it has always been that way and will always be that way. This reasoning propels heteronormativity, because it just seems natural to be oriented towards one thing (an opposite sexed individual) and away from another (same-sexed individual.) If we thought of orientations as fluid, what possibilities could be opened to us for disrupting the status quo, involving sexuality or any other marginalized identification?

Ahmed, Sara. "Queer Feelings." The Cultural Politics of Emotion. New York:
Routledge, 2004. 144-67. Print