Tuesday, May 2, 2017

On January 27th, just days after being inaugurated the President of the United States, Donald Trump made an executive order. This order suspended the travel of people from six predominately Muslim countries into the United States for 120 days. The executive order itself states that the government and Donald Trump himself  are "Protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry into the United States". Many people have mixed reviews of this specific order and why it is controversial. The order has received the nickname of "Muslim Ban", obviously something that hasn't been sitting well with people across the U.S. and other countries. But others believe that this is just an order to keep the people that do not agree with the U.S. constitution and what we stand for as a country, out. But the media has a big part in this issue as well. With the recent resurfacing of the term "fake news", there have been many news articles that have come out about this order. Many have used the term "Muslim Ban" to explain Trump's new order but some have just stuck to the order's name itself. The specific artifact I am taking a look at is a news article called "Why Trump's travel ban is still a Muslim ban". In using this artifact I will use Burke's Pentad to evaluate the article and the issues surrounding this specific topic. I believe that the Pentad will be of most significance to this artifact because it almost communicates itself as a storyline. It focuses on the background and the present situation of a piece of work and communicates its significance through those means. I believe this type of criticism is going to be most significant to me because of the nature of this executive order. The United States and the countries that have been listed in the order have had a past with each other. This will provide significant background information for the criticism and allow us to also look in the past while focusing on the present situation. Using the act, agent, agency, purpose, and scene I can draw conclusions from this piece of work and make an informed conclusion about the rhetoric used in this article. As I have explained, this method is most appropriate because of the context of the executive order. There is a lot of plot behind this order because of our relationship with these specific countries over the past couple of decades. This form of criticism will help me dissect the background, who did or said what,  and then eventually lead up to the present situation and the executive order that has been talked about so heavily.