Gandhi and the comic frame: "Ad bellum purificandum"

Gandhi’s concept of civil disobedience is analyzed through an application of Kenneth Burke’s "comic frame." His leadership of the Indian civil rights movement is characterized by a ritual form emphasizing a recognition of both social and individual power, attempts at identification with the social order even while attacking it, and an emphasis on epiphany as a ritual goal. The "comic frame," it is argued, is a useful construct for interpreting and assessing certain rhetorical movements.