Argumentative Strategies Research Articles

Writing Research Gap Strategies in Indonesian Articles Abstracts and Introductions in Accredited National Journals towards International Indexed Publications

Research gap (RG), studies in the abstract and introduction sections in the last 5 years have been widely conducted by researchers. Still, the writers must write this adequately even though writing RG in these two sections is crafting a research article. The novelty constructed in this study is the writing of RG strategies in the introduction and abstract sections by Indonesian-language article writers in accredited national journals. This is believed to further boost the quality of articles and convince readers to read the article further. Data in the form of author speech when reconstructing RG strategies in the abstract and introduction sections. Data collection using document techniques. Miles's (2017) theory was used to analyze the data, with thematic analysis techniques. Findings; (a) the use of research gap strategies in the introduction in the form of knowledge gaps (KG), (b) but this tendency is not used if the author uses evidence gap (EG), practical knowledge gap (PKG), and theoretical gap (TG) strategies. Furthermore, (c) RG is only written once in the introduction and abstract sections. Based on observations of 4 Sinta 2 journals, with a study of 40 articles in Indonesian, only 2.86 percent wrote gap research in the introduction, and 2.5% wrote RG in the abstract. The implication is that the RG writing style in the introduction and abstract needs to be infused more significantly because the writing of RG in both parts has a significant effect on the quality of the article. The limitation of this study is only carried out for Indonesian articles that have been published in indexed national journals (Sinta2), so further research is needed to formulate a novelty strategy, and formulate an argumentative strategy that is evaluative, critical, and problematic in the abstract and introduction writing sections so that readers are more interested in reading the article.

The Logical Perspective in Pragma-dialectics

AbstractI argue that the logical perspective—the study of arguments as products—is not well integrated into pragma-dialectics. I show that the Validity Rule and the Argumentation Scheme Rule, despite being procedural rules, are, in a certain sense, “logical” rules. Subsequently, I distinguish and review three successive periods in the development of the logical dimension of pragma-dialectics: conventionalist, inferentialist and dualist, to reveal that none of them is completely satisfactory. I contend that, given the assumptions and conceptual apparatus of pragma-dialectics, the integration of the logical perspective, and especially of a suitable account of counterargumentation, requires the adoption of a conception of logic as a theory of reasons, as opposed to the traditional conception of logic as a theory of inferences. Understanding logic as a theory of the dialogical construction of reasons enables us to approach the study of the relationships between arguments and the weighing of opposing arguments.

STAGES OF THE ANALYSIS OF RELIGIOUS VOCABULARY IN THE AMERICAN PRESIDENTIAL DISCOURSE

The article is devoted to a review of the methodology for analyzing the functioning of religious vocabulary in the American presidential discourse. The work defines the political discourse, distinguishes the genres of the American presidential discourse, develops an algorithm for their research, and highlights the methods of analysis. One of the types of institutional discourse is political discourse, which is a reflection of the socio-political life of the country, contains elements of its culture, as well as features of the national character, general and national-specific cultural values, and aims to gain and maintain political power. The main functions of political discourse are informative, instrumental, prognostic, normative, legitimating, persuasive and political propaganda. The genre space of the presidential discourse is determined by the general political system of the state, the historical and political traditions of the institution of the presidency, and the sociocultural conditions for the existence of political discourse. These extralinguistic factors, as well as the nature of the main intention, allow us to distinguish such genres of US presidential discourse as ritualistic, orientational, and agonal. In the linguistic literature, there is a large number of classifications of political discourse strategies. In our work, we adhere to the classification according to which the following communicative strategies are inherent in political discourse: self-presentation, discrediting, manipulation, self-defense, information-interpretive, forming the emotional mood of the addressee, argumentative strategy, agitation. Each of these strategies is represented by a number of tactics. The search for effective ways of analyzing and describing the semantics and function of religious vocabulary in the American presidential discourse determined the choice of the main approaches to the research object. The methods used in linguistic studies involve the implementation of a system of procedures for studying the object of research and verification of the obtained results. Typical guidelines of systematic philological analysis include paying attention to the semantic, substantive side of the text, represented by text categories, and to the communicative immersion of the text in discursive reproduction. For a systemic complex analysis, the work involves such methods that take into account the communicative essence of the discourse text, reflect the significance of the text in the light of its generation and interpretation.

The argument from undecidable dissension

The five modes of suspension of judgment outlined by Sextus Empiricus (HP XV 164-188) coordinate a complex argumentative strategy to prompt the general suspension of judgment. But modes (τρόπος) are general argument forms that can be deployed individually against the dogmatist, who is willing to accept that a certain answer to a question establishes how things really are. In this case, the aim of the modes is not the general suspension of judgment but the continuation of the investigation. I present a deductive version of the mode of undecidable dissension that pinpoints some principles and assumptions the skeptics requires to run their arguments.

They feelin’ some type of way: antiblackness, speaking black flesh and the problem of interracial allyship

Competitive policy debate, an activity touted to train political leaders and civic participants, is mired in conflict over the rise of Black student participation. Diversity outreach efforts in the 1990s offered an opportunity to increase black participation significantly in the activity. These efforts at inclusion generated racial turbulence as Black students brought black theory, performance and culture to the fore as the grounding for their argumentative strategies. While the scholarship about Black activism in policy debate has focused on the reaction of the traditionalists attempting to protect the norms of competition, it is simultaneously salient to analyze white liberal and progressive responses to the disruption caused by Black debaters. Drawing on the themes of civility and mutual recognition, I encourage argument theorists to consider how the structure of anti-blackness offers a fundamental antagonism to interracial debate and deliberation. This article delves into a racialized conflict between two teams who were part of a broad-based coalition of debaters disrupting normative argumentative and performative practice in debate competitions, arguing that violating the norms of competition and standards of civility represents a necessary strategy for Black folks arguing about anti-black racism in the interracial context of competitive debate.

Pilgrim links in women's stories in the Noble Qur'an

The stories of women in the Holy Qur'an abound in the persuasive language, and this is due to the diversity of its topics and the multiplicity of recipients in it, so we find it employing many deliberative argumentative strategies, including persuasive connectors. To find out the extent of its argumentative strength and the role it participated in bringing together and linking meanings, and achieving persuasion and influence, the research dealt with a group of argumentative connectors. The argumentative connectors link the argument and the result for interpretation and reasoning, and help to arrange and sequence events and link meanings to each other, and hence they form a persuasive structure by which persuasion reaches to fit the idea when addressed. This study aims to uncover these connectors via depending on the descriptive analytical approach. The research concluded that persuasion in the stories of women, in the Holy Qur'an, is a direct intentional process on the opinions of individuals, their behavior and beliefs, thus these stories are the transmission of the message from the sender to the recipient in order to influence his/her attitudes, thoughts and behaviors, and convince him/her of the idea.

“China’s Foreign Aid” and “China’s National Image” in the Eyes of Foreign Media: A Corpus-Based Discourse-Historical Analysis

China’s foreign aid implements the concept of a community with a shared future for mankind and promotes the common progress of China and developing countries. News about China’s foreign aid released by foreign media is quite significant for overseas audiences to perceive China’s image. This study adopts Ruth Wodak’s discourse-historical approach and corpus-based method to interpret foreign news reports on China’s foreign aid. The macro-level news themes, meso-level discourse strategies and national images, as well as micro-level discourse features are explained with examples. Research shows that news themes reveal the objects, fields and methods of China’s foreign aid. Foreign media widely adopt discourse strategies of nomination, predication, argumentation, perspectivation, intensification and mitigation to shape China as a friendly international donor. A few characteristics of news discourse indicate that several media misunderstand or smear China’s foreign aid, which has a negative impact on China’s international public opinion environment. Therefore, building an effective external voice platform to convey China’s international responsibilities and contributions is necessary, which helps establish a favorable international public opinion environment for China’s development and call on other countries to make efforts to reduce human poverty.

Pathos in Natural Language Argumentation: Emotional Appeals and Reactions

In this paper, we present a model of pathos, delineate its operationalisation, and demonstrate its utility through an analysis of natural language argumentation. We understand pathos as an interactional persuasive process in which speakers are performing pathos appeals and the audience experiences emotional reactions. We analyse two strategies of such appeals in pre-election debates: pathotic Argument Schemes based on the taxonomy proposed by Walton et al. (Argumentation schemes, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2008), and emotion-eliciting language based on psychological lexicons of emotive words (Wierzba in Behav Res Methods 54:2146–2161, 2021). In order to match the appeals with possible reactions, we collect real-time social media reactions to the debates and apply sentiment analysis (Alswaidan and Menai in Knowl Inf Syst 62:2937–2987, 2020) method to observe emotion expressed in language. The results point to the importance of pathos analysis in modern discourse: speakers in political debates refer to emotions in most of their arguments, and the audience in social media reacts to those appeals using emotion-expressing language. Our results show that pathos is a common strategy in natural language argumentation which can be analysed with the support of computational methods.

On being drawn to different types of arguments: a mouse-tracking study

How people distinguish well-justified from poorly justified arguments is not well known. To study the involvement of intuitive and analytic cognitive processes, we contrasted participants’ personal beliefs with argument strength that was determined in relation to established criteria of sound argumentation. In line with previous findings indicating that people have a myside bias, participants (N = 249) made more errors on conflict than on no-conflict trials. On conflict trials, errors and correct responses were practically equal in terms of response times and mouse-tracking indices of hesitation. Similarly to recent findings on formal reasoning, these findings indicate that correct reasoning about informal arguments may not necessitate corrective analytic processing. We compared findings across four argument schemes but found few differences. The findings are discussed in light of intuitive logic theories and the notion that evaluating informal arguments could be based on implicit knowledge of argument criteria.

Representation of Victim and Perpetrator in Adelina Lisao’s Abuse Case in Malaysian Online News Articles

This research analyses the representation of victim and perpetrator as social actors and its argumentation strategies from Malaysian online news articles surrounding the tragic case of Adelina Lisao, an Indonesian domestic worker who lost her life in Malaysia due to abuse by her employer. Employing a qualitative research approach, the data is systematically collected with keywords to identify relevant news articles pertinent to the case: "Adelina Lisao” and “Ambika Shan”. This research utilises the Social Actor’s Network (SAN) and the Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) framework, specifically the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA), to examine 39 online news articles about the case from the most popular Malaysian news website in 2023, Malaysiakini. The findings revealed that Adelina Lisao was mostly represented as a passive receiver of the abuse, while Ambika Shan’s role as a perpetrator was mostly backgrounded. The findings contribute to a better understanding of how social actors are portrayed on online websites and the argumentation strategies within the context of domestic worker abuse cases in Malaysia. Thus, it acknowledges the importance of language in online news discourse in shaping public perceptions, particularly regarding domestic workers in Malaysia as evidenced by the representation of victim-perpetrator dynamics in such cases.

“So I know how to do this”

Abstract Debates are important events during presidential elections in the U.S.A. Candidates are juxtaposed and engage with each other on a wide range of issues. This poses the question how disagreement between the two candidates and the public is managed. The aim of this paper is to articulate the prototypical argumentative pattern used by candidates which shows that to defend that the public should vote for them, candidates recurringly make three central claims. Specifically, they claim that some political action has to happen, they will do that action if elected, while their opponent will not. This basic argument scheme – which could be referred to as campaign promise argumentation – is further expanded by candidates by responding to six distinct critical questions, resulting in a prototypical argumentative pattern designed to deal with potential criticisms against a bid to become president.

Epidemiology of Fallacies

In this paper I apply the epidemiological model of the spread of beliefs and how they become cultural representations to the field of fallacies. The model suggests that beliefs tend to replicate as a virus does in a potential epidemic, and those strains that are dominant in a given socio-cultural sphere become cultural representations. My ultimate aim is to denounce the fact that some presumptive argumentation schemes are widely applied as definitive arguments, but turn out to be instances of common and traditional fallacies. Moreover, some such fallacies have managed to colonise the human mind and become cultural representations in society today. Adopting the approach I advocate here, we could say that the fallacy has become a belief, which has then managed to replicate like a virus, and finally the fallacy has become a cultural representation. One of the great harms that results from this process is that it is very difficult to open up effective lines of argument that expose the fallacious nature of these new and perverse cultural representations.

Small states and coalition building in extremis: the Netherlands and the adoption of the Conditionality Regulation linking rule of law and the EU budget

ABSTRACT This article analyses how the Netherlands was able to successfully influence the adoption of the Conditionality Regulation in the absence of leadership by a large EU Member State and without advancing only its own material interests. An empirical analysis based on careful process-tracing and interviews shows that the small-state strategy of coalition building with like-minded states and EU institutions was essential. This article extends beyond what is available in the literature through explaining the conditions for successful coalition-building strategies. Successful coalition building by small states is dependent on their argumentative power and their reputations as ‘norm advocates’ and requires high-quality and coherent arguments. This article sheds light on how coalition-building and argumentative strategies relate to each other.

The Appeal to Nature in Cicero's De finibus

When Cicero examines the varied versions of cradle arguments that appear in De finibus, he finds much to criticize. Though he rejects these attempts to discern our proper ethical ends from the earliest inclinations of newborn animals, he nevertheless accepts that human beings should adopt ends for themselves that are consistent with, and perfections of, human nature. I argue that Cicero uses two connected argumentative strategies to create an appeal to nature that overcomes some basic problems he has with the cradle arguments used in Epicureanism, Stoicism, and the Old Academy. The first strategy criticizes the different cradle arguments directly, by which Cicero establishes two negative criteria for any appeal to nature. These criteria indicate what to avoid in arguing for a highest moral end or summum bonum. These criteria eliminate the Epicurean and Stoic cradle arguments, and more subtly criticizes the Antiochian one. As a result, it may seem plausible that Cicero either adopts the Antiochian position himself or that he at least considers it to be a strong position that is worthy of further consideration, particularly in contrast with his categorical rejection of the other schools. Cicero’s second strategy, however, leads us away from accepting any established cradle argument, including the Antiochian one. This strategy develops a rich theme of education over the course of the text and emphasizes an appeal to the telic sense of “nature” that ultimately meets the two criteria set out by his first strategy. He does not seek ethical direction in some biological origin and given nature as cradle arguments do. Cicero appeals instead to human nature and its summum bonum as it appears during philosophical education. Though he finds cradle arguments rely too much on given nature and too little on telic nature, Cicero’s own own emphasis on education and telic nature amounts to a new appeal to “nature” that, in avoiding the “cradle”, is more sound than those of his philosophical rivals.

VERBAL AGGRESSION AND FALSE ARGUMENTS IN CRISIS POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

In this study we focus on political discourse and political communication in periods of crisis in order to characterize the speech of public figures from Bulgarian and Czech political life. The text examines political discourse in Bulgaria and the Czech Republic in the context of important crisis events in the political life of both countries - votes of no confidence in the governments. In the studied linguistic material analogical patterns of realization of communicative strategies are observed: linguistic aggression, use of false argumentation, expressed in accusing the opponent of incompetence and committing fraud, excessive use of lexemes with negative connotation, suggesting a sense of catastrophe and misfortune. The intensification of the message is also achieved through the use of a number of lexemes with a negative connotation, which is characteristic of aggression in political speech. As a means to achieve these goals, communication in political discourse usually uses expressive or other marked lexical expressions, as well as false argumentative strategies, aimed not at the content and nature of the problem, but at attacking the positive image of the communication partner. In the corpus of linguistic material studied, linguistic aggression based on the assertion of one's own personality, independently of the communication partner, was identified with high frequency. In the examples given, there is always a conscious linguistic strategy and intent that is clearly identifiable in a given communicative moment.

The possibility of knowing the essence of bodies through scientific experiments in Spinoza’s controversy with Boyle

ABSTRACT In this paper, I argue for a novel reading of Spinoza’s position in his exchange with Boyle about Boyle’s experiment with nitre. Boyle claimed to have shown through experiments that nitre ceased to be nitre after heating. Spinoza disagreed and proposed the alternative hypothesis that nitre has changed its state and not its nature. Spinoza’s position was construed in the literature as rational scepticism denying that experiments can yield knowledge of essences because all sensory experience is underdetermined and open to multiple interpretations. I argue for an alternative reading of Spinoza’s position which focuses on Bacon’s notion of crucial instance. According to this reading, Spinoza did not deny the possibility of knowing by experimentation whether nitre has changed its nature, he asked for a crucial instance, i.e. an experiment that would refute the hypothesis that nitre has changed merely its state. Spinoza’s argumentative strategy shows that, contrary to the mainstream reading, the representational content of sensory ideas can be determined even if it does not represent the essence of the object: we can know with absolute, rather than merely moral, certainty whether nitre ceased to be nitre without knowing what nitre is.

Neoliberalism, alternatives and (de)politicisation: Analysis of political discourse during the coronavirus crisis

This study denaturalises the prevailing belief that crises bolster neoliberalism. It contends that context matters deeply – particularly in the lead-up to elections – and that not all politicians advocate a neoliberal agenda. Furthermore, it uncovers the cyclical relationship between (de)politicisation and coronavirus crisis in Czechia. The research employs discursive historical approach and critical discourse analysis to answer following research questions: 1) During the coronavirus crisis, did elite and expert discourse reinforce neoliberal hegemony or promote alternatives? 2) How did this manifest in their discourse? and 3) Was the crisis (de)politicised? The results show that the discourse of elites did not deepen neoliberalisation, since other discursive themes appeared. Politicians mostly used strategy of argumentation and intensification to legitimise measures, which the study describes in detail. Regarding (de)politicisation, a cycle occurred where the crisis was not politicised initially, but when vaccines were addressed, the crisis became a source of political conflict. With a new government coming in, the data suggest depoliticisation again.

Neoliberal Feminism and Political Leadership: The Representation of Giorgia Meloni and Elly Schlein in Popular Culture

Building on a long tradition of studies on the intertwining of politics and popular culture, the article examines the representation of the two Italian political leaders of the moment, Giorgia Meloni and Elly Schlein, offered by women’s magazines. The study focuses in particular on two interrelated aspects: on the one hand, the extent to which the discursive strategies to talk about the leaders, their personal lives, careers and ideas contribute to strengthen the contemporary hegemony on feminism; on the other hand, the discursive strategies used to represent the leaders through a frame of competition typical of the neoliberalism. Indeed, we refer to the most recent trends in feminism research, contested among post-feminism, neoliberal feminism and celebrity feminism. Within this framework, we examined whether and how female political leaders can become icons of life, style and power in a way that is functional to the neoliberal narrative. The critical discourse analysis conducted on eight Italian women’s magazines over the course of a year makes it possible to highlight some results that contribute to the reflection on neoliberal feminism and female leadership. In particular, leaders are presented through argumentative strategies of genealogism, exceptionalism and compensation: the ways in which magazines justify their position of power refer to family relationships and character qualities, emphasizing the characteristics closest to the neoliberal model and overshadowing all others, including political ideas. Rather, leaders are deradicalized and depoliticized to favour instead a reassuring narrative in which women have broken the glass ceiling. In that way, women’s magazines renounce representing women leaders for their ideas and ideologies, and instead focus on their unique mark of difference: their gender.

The Specter of Revealed Preference Theory

My aim in this paper is to argue that the recent philosophical defenses of revealed preference theory do not withstand scrutiny. Towards this aim, I will first outline revealed preference theory. I will then briefly present the two most common arguments that the received view offers against it. Afterwards, I will outline three argumentative strategies for rehabilitating revealed preference theory, and successively rebut each of them.

Effect of the Dialogue and Argumentation Strategy on the Academic Achievement of Ordinary Level Students in Zimbabwe

The purpose of the study was to examine the effect of the dialogue and argumentation strategy on the academic achievement of mathematics students studying the subject at ordinary level. The research strategy used was a descriptive survey. A quantitative approach that used a structured questionnaire for data collection from a sample of 100 O’ level Mathematics teachers was used. Data validation was done using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). The Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was used for data analysis. The empirical findings of the study indicated that all the factors of dialogue and argumentation strategy namely: collective teaching, purposeful teaching, supportive teaching, reciprocal teaching, cumulative teaching and pedagogical repertoires have a significant and positive influence on the teaching of ordinary level mathematics. These results demonstrate that the dialogue and argumentation strategy has a significant effect on the academic achievement of ordinary level mathematics students. The main study limitation was that the findings of this study might not be transferable nationally since the study was delimitated to only schools in Gutu district of Masvingo province in Zimbabwe. These results have implications on the effective teaching of ordinary mathematics in secondary schools in Zimbabwe.