Rhetoric in the Mixed Game

Abstract

The paper starts from the assumption that rhetoric is inherent to dialogue. Such a view is based on the Theory of Dialogic Action Games or the Mixed Game Model, which is a theory about human beings’ complex ability to come to terms with dialogic issues in ever-changing surroundings. Human beings are not lost in the chaos of ever-varying empirical data but are competent-to-perform in their own interests, i.e. competent to effecttively achieve their purposes in dialogic action games. Models of dialogue usually proceed either by abstraction to rule-governed patterns of competence or by reducing the object-of-study to empirical elements. In contrast to such reductionist models of the simple, the theory of the dialogic action game represents an adventure in the complex of the mixed game of human action. Basic premises and methodological principles of the theory will be briefly introduced. A sample analysis of a political Round Table discussion demonstrates how the model works.