Making Sense Of Messages Analysis

1. The message I have chosen for the assignment, and am my considering for the final project, is a video from The Foundation for a Better Life. The video, titled “Purse,” features the story of a young, gothic teenager sitting at a bus stop in as urban city who runs to return a middle-aged woman’s purse to her after she forgets the bag at the bus stop (“See the Pass,” n.d.). The message is linked below and is also officially cited in the references at the end of the document: https://www.passiton.com/inspirational-stories-tv-spots/112-purse 2. Chapter thirteen of Making Sense of Messages by Mark Stoner and Sally Perkins (2005) discusses Kenneth Burke’s pentad and the relationships between the five elements of the pentad (p. 219 – 226). The five elements of Burke’s pentad are “Act,” “Agent,” “Agency,” “Scene,” and “Purpose”, (Stoner & Perkins, 2005, p. 220) The elements of the pentad can be identified and applied to the features of the video.
Relatedly, performing the feature action, makes the young, gothic teenager, who is featured throughout the video (“See the Pass,” n.d.), the agent of the message. Third, the boy runs to the woman when she exits the bus at the next stop and physically hands the bag back to her (“See the Pass,” n.d., 0:35 – 0:49), which suggests that he uses physical action to carry out the act, making his physical actions the agency of the message. Fourth, the video opens to an urban city, and specifically to a bus stop, (“See the Pass,” n.d., 0:00 – 0:05), which is the scene of the message. Lastly, as evidenced by the end of the video, the boy returns the purse to the woman (“See the Pass,” n.d., 0:40 – 0:44), which was his purpose in committing the