The Pragmatics of Cogent Argumentation in British and American Political Debates (original) (raw)

Argumentation in Political Discourse: Semantic, Composition and Stylistic Register

Humanities and Social Sciences Review (HSSR), 2019

The research paper deals with the investigation of the power of persuasion in the argumentative discourse. The strategy of persuasion is regarded as a scheme of interactive pragmatic argumentation which is actualized in speeches. Verbalization of persuasive tactics creates a communicative portrait of a speaker as well as their own individual styles. We focused on psycholinguistics aspect of persuasive language analysis and composition technics in the structure of argumentation.

The development of the pragma-dialectical approach to argumentation

Argumentation, 2003

This paper describes the development of pragma-dialectics as a theory of argumentative discourse. First the development of the pragma-dialectical model of a critical discussion is explained, with the rules that are to be complied with in order to avoid fallacies from occurring. Then the integration is discussed of rhetorical insight in the dialectical framework. In this endeavour, the concept of strategic manoeuvring is explained that allows for a more refined and more profoundly justified analysis of argumentative discourse and a better identification of fallacies. The paper ends with a brief overview of current research projects.

Strategic maneuvering in argumentative discourse in political deliberation

Argumentation in political deliberation, 2013

In this essay, first the pragma-dialectical theory of strategic maneuvering is explained. Then the focus is on the conventionalization of communicative practices in communicative activity types and the institutional constraints it imposes on strategic maneuvering. Thus, an adequate background is created for discussing, on the basis of several recent projects, pragma-dialectical research of argumentative discourse in the political domain.

Pragmatics of Political Discourse

Political language is not in essence any different from other manifestations of language and therefore its specificity must be sought instead in the particular relationships that are established between the discourse itself and the extralinguistic context (Van Dijk, 1997, p. 24). It is there, within that framework of specific historical, economic and social coordinates, where the forms of political language appear in a more extreme way than in other textual genres and where the relationships between the explicit and implicit meanings become especially relevant. Whatever the case may be, when it comes to defining the limits of this discursive genre it would be wise to distinguish, at least initially, between political discourse in the strict sense of the term and other forms of public discourse with potential political implications (e.g. scholarly discourse, legal discourse, etc.). In this chapter, we will focus on analysing the first of these two discursive practices, so we will refer mainly to the first-frame participants in political discourse, such as politicians going about their parliamentary activity, being interviewed by journalists from the media, confronting each other in parliamentary and electoral melees or giving speeches before overjoyed followers at public addresses. Of the many subjects that can be discussed in the analysis of this type of discourse in the literature, in these pages we will review several pragmatic aspects of these verbal interactions in which politicians usually participate, such as some strategies and formats used by politicians in their interactions with journalists in political interviews (section 2), the different types of audiences faced and the tactics they usually display in order to seduce them (section 3), the face-work exhibited in conflict discourses between antagonists during political debates (section 4), or the increased number of mediatisation and conversationalisation processes in the way politics has been ‘doing’ in recent times (section 5). Now, considering the complexities of dealing with all these issues around the world, in this introduction we will focus mainly on political discourse pronounced in western democracies and, in particular, on the communicative behaviour that politicians usually display in some of the abovementioned subgenres and types of media, especially TV. Nevertheless, for space reasons, the new interactive media, in which politicians have recently begun to establish new forms of interaction with people (blogs, chats, social networks, etc.) will be dealt with only in passing (see section 5).

A Pragma-Dialectical Approach to Argumentative Discourse

Theoretical and procedural diverseness is a feature characterising the study of argumentation. The common core in all perspectives is to examine a type of discourse which attempts to convince another party of the acceptability of one’s view(s) through a set of arguments, but what differs, to a larger or lesser extent, is the theoretical apparatus through which discourse is scrutinised. The present paper offers a general account of the pragma-dialectical approach to argumentation. Expatiating on the principal theoretical and methodological lines on which the theory proceeds, the paper aims at delineating the analytical tools provided in this paradigm to handle the intricacies of argumentative discourse.

Quality Of Arguments Used In The First-Round Presidential Debate: Critical Pragmatics And Stephen Toulmin‘s Perspective

International Journal of Engineering and Advanced Technology

It is important for politicians to have a good argumentative skill. For state leaders, the ability to think logically, to use rhetoric, and to argue systematically, scientifically, sharply, and eloquently is very crucial. The year 2019 is the political year for Indonesia. Political campaigns leading to the presidential and the legislative election, both in national and regional levels, will happen in 2019. The focus of this research is to investigate the depth and breadth of the arguments stated by the presidential candidates and how those arguments are presented. The research substantial data source is in the form of speech transcript of the recorded video of the firstround presidential debate by two pairs of president and vicepresident candidates. The research data were the debate arguments found in the video transcript and the contexts surrounding them. The data gathering method used observation by employing recording and note-taking techniques. After the data were gathered, they...

Pragmatic argumentation in lawmaking debates. Phd dissertation (Published). Ch. 1-3

SicSat, 2012

Instruments for the analysis and evaluation of pragmatic argumentation at the Second Reading of the British Parliament ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. D.C. van de Boom ten overstaan van een door het college voor promoties ingestelde commissie, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de Agnietenkapel op vrijdag

The Making of Argumentation Theory: A Pragma-dialectical View

Argumentation, 2023

In 'The making of argumentation theory' van Eemeren and van Haaften describe the contributions made to the five components of a full-fledged research program of argumentation theory by four prominent approaches to the discipline: formal dialectics, rhetoric/pragmalinguistics, informal logic, and pragma-dialectics. Most of these approaches do not contribute to all components, but to some in particular. Starting from the pragma-dialectical view of the relationship between dialectical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness-the crucial issue in argumentation theory-van Eemeren and van Haaften explain the positions taken by representatives from the approaches discussed and indicate where they differ from the pragma-dialectical approach. It transpires that approaches focusing on dialectical reasonableness are, next to pragma-dialectics, formal dialectics and informal logic; approaches focusing on rhetorical effectiveness are, next to pragma-dialectics, rhetoric and pragmalinguistics, and the informal logician Tindale. When it comes to the relationship between dialectical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness, some interest in it is shown in rhetoric and pragmalinguistics, but only in pragma-dialectics and in Tindale's work is it a real focus. The main difference between Tindale's view and the pragma-dialectical view is that in pragma-dialectics the decisive role in deciding about reasonableness is assigned to a code of conduct for reasonable argumentative discourse and in Tindale's approach this role is assigned to Tindale's interpretation of the Perelmanian universal audience.