Item Details

title

THE NUCLEAR ARJUNA: A NARRATIVE CRITICISM OF VAJPAYEE'S LOK SABHA ADDRESS

author

DeLong, Brian LaMonte

abstract

The thesis is a rhetorical and narrative criticism of Atal Bihari Vajpayee's 1998 pro-nuclear Lok Sabha address. Through Walter Fisher's narrative paradigm, I argue that Vajpayee's rhetoric uses the powerful values of the Hindu myth of Arjuna in the Bhagivad Gita to justify India's moves towards nuclear acquisition. The myth's function for the Prime Minister's justificatory discourse is to absolve conflicting moral identities of the present pro-nuclear India with the nation's staunch anti-nuclear past. Vajpayee's address, as a narrative containing good reasons for the nation's nuclear transition, elevates the nation's public moral debate to the transcendent values expressed by the 3,000 year old myth. As the greatest warrior of the Mahabharata, Arjuna operates as the universal human being who is struggling with moral choices between right and wrong actions. The Gita's conclusion with the warrior engaging in the Kurukshetra war becomes a powerful narrative that is made representative of Vajpayee's transition away from India's twenty-four year period of nuclear ambiguity.

subject

India

Myth

Narrative

Nuclear

Rhetoric

Vajpayee

contributor

Beasley Von Burg, Alessandra (committee chair)

Louden, Allan (committee member)

Zulick, Margaret (committee member)

date

2011-02-16T21:42:13Z (accessioned)

2011-03-30T14:04:37Z (available)

2010 (issued)

degree

Communication (discipline)

embargo

2011-02-17 (terms)

identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/30395 (uri)

language

en (iso)

publisher

Wake Forest University

type

Thesis