Abstract
The paper deals with the visual and verbal modes as well as interrelations between them employed in dominant argumentation on the British and German magazine covers devoted to president Donald J. Trump. Following the concept of multimodality and the notion of enthymemes the author discusses analogy and causality as predominant types of argumentation occurring on the covers of THE ECONOMIST and DER SPIEGEL and illustrates the contribution of the visual image to the (re-)construction of the tacit components of the argumentation.
Highlights
In the age of infotainment and sensory overload, magazine covers are of particular importance, as they influence the decision to purchase and read an issue of the magazine in question
The proposed analysis concentrates on the front pages of British and German opinion-forming weekly magazines THE ECONOMIST and DER SPIEGEL published between November 2016
The analysed covers dedicated to Trump were published between November 2016 and November 2020 and indicate comparable media attention paid by both magazines to his presidency within the four years between the subsequent presidential general elections
Summary
In the age of infotainment and sensory overload, magazine covers are of particular importance, as they influence the decision to purchase and read an issue of the magazine in question. In such a case the suppressed parts are to be (re-) produced and interpreted by the recipients on the basis of the existing components and/or their world and contextual knowledge (Wengeler 2003, 62) This incomplete, abbreviated argumentation procedure, traditionally referred to as enthymeme, can be explained as follows:. Apart from the variable order and reducibility, another important feature of the enthymeme is its truth value: in contrast to the so-called logical syllogism, which aims at truth in the strict sense of the word, such a reduced argumentation procedure is employed to justify discussed issues, without claiming the truth of the argument and the premise(s) (Wengeler 2003, 60). Analogical reasoning is a universal feature of human thinking and one of the most common methods employed in communicating to comprehend, explain, justify, and make judgements and/or decisions It involves noting the shared properties of two or more entities and inferring similarities in some further respect. As will be shown below inferences from comparisons seem to be fruitful in the analysed material
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