Interpersonal Rhetoric Research Articles

Analysing analytical minds. An interpersonal pragmatics approach to literary discourse

Abstract Taking an interpersonal pragmatics approach, this paper aims to view literary text as social discourse where conversational exchanges convey more than the content of talk. Applying the method of interpersonal pragmatic analysis, centred around the notions of implicatures and the concept of face in pragmatics, the social status of speakers is revealed via expressing their personal desires, preferences and professional ambitions. Combining the models of pragmatic stylistics analysis and the conception of interpersonal rhetoric (Leech, 1983) enables effective exploration of the interplay between characters, their efforts to comply with the cooperative and politeness principles, following particular communicative goals in conversations, making inferences and understanding implicatures. Focusing on the above-stated aims of research, the historical thriller The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld (2006) was chosen as the subject of analysis. In this novel, psychoanalysis and interpretation of a patient’s/victim’s responses, the unique application of professional expertise in psychoanalysis, palpable rivalry between scholars, as well as a desire for international recognition provide rich material for analysis. The presented research contributes new insights into the scholarly debate on interpersonal pragmatics, showing that approaching literary discourse analysis via a pragmatic stylistics approach is relevant and beneficial.

LINGUISTIC ASPECT OF THE CATEGORY OF POLITENESS IN ADVERTISING DISCOURSE

The paper highlights the correlation between the concepts of etiquette and politeness in terms of advertising discourse. It is stated modern research on language and speech is becoming more and more interdisciplinary, focusing on functioning the language in various social and cultural contexts. Differentiation of the concepts of etiquette, politeness and etiquetization is considered. Etiquette is the broadest concept that can be defined as the objectification of existing norms of social relations in society. Politeness as a complex sociocultural phenomenon, contributing to the success of communication, is one of the means of expression of etiquette. Etiquetization is a principle of speech politeness, which is designed to facilitate the flow of communication and achieve the goals of the addressee. The category of etiquette in advertising discourse is realized through the category of etiquetization on the basis of the main features of speech politeness: care for the recipient (facilitating the perception of information by the recipient) and modulation of categorical and non-categorical nomination with predominance of non-categorical (based on objectivity, impartiality and persuasiveness). The main means of politeness include caring for the addressee (facilitating the recipient’s perception of information) and modulating the categorical and non-categorical nomination with a predominance of non-categorical (based on objectivity, impartiality and motivation) to convince the addressee of that or another statement. Politeness as a manifestation of the purposefulness of language behavior is mostly considered on the basis of rhetorical pragmatics, determining the speaker’s illocutionary goals (which speech acts are conveyed through utterances) and their social goals (speaker status depending on his courtesy, truthfulness, and irony) as well as distinguishing between interpersonal rhetoric and textual rhetoric, each consisting of a set of maxims. Keywords: advertising discourse; etiquette; etiquetization; politeness; rhetorical pragmatics.

Интерпретация феномена вежливости в трудах британского лингвиста Джеффри Лича

The purpose of the study is to identify the basic and additional aspects of the concept of politeness developed by Geoffrey Leech. Novelty of the study lies in conducting a comprehensive analysis of the British linguist’s views on the phenomenon of politeness. The obtained results have shown that the basic aspects of the considered concept include the principle of politeness, the notion of “speech events” and the notion of “communicative altruism”, while additional aspects include the idea of relationship between the principle of politeness and the principle of cooperation, the principle of irony, textual and interpersonal rhetoric, absolute and relative politeness and the maxims of speech communication.

Interpersonal rhetoric of attitude in news

Abstract Drawing on principles of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) the proposed study examined and compared the attitudinal positioning of both CNN and Al-Jazeera English (AJE) concerning Iran’s Nuclear Program (INP). The paper has employed the appraisal framework (Martin & White 2005) to reveal the different subtypes of attitude, i.e., affect, judgment, and appreciation, which have been encoded in the selected news items. It has been found that AJE discourse is highly evaluated. AJE has appraised INP positively; yet, it has evaluated Iran (apart from INP) and the US negatively. Unlike CNN, it is very obvious that AJE has various agendas. To achieve its goals, AJE has employed judgment more than the other subsystems of attitude. This is not surprising, given that the function of judgment is to judge people and their actions rather than things. This may explain why AJE news coverage is biased. On the other hand, although CNN relies heavily on appreciation, its coverage is biased as well. Indirectly through appreciating INP as being a nuclear weapons program, CNN has tried to invoke readers’ judgment of Iran. In addition, CNN has highlighted aspects of their opposition towards Iran such as unity, unification, consensus, etc, through the use of (+sec). Unlike AJE, CNN has one agenda and they achieved it through appraising the “self” positively and the “other”, i.e., Iran negatively.

The use of modality markers to perform hegemony politeness in using Balinese language: a case study on Awig-awig

This research was aimed at expressing motivation to use modality markers in text of traditional village regulation (awig-awig). The data was obtained from some major regulations in five regencies and city in Bali province. Sampling was done based on area considering dialectical and sociocultural diversity. Based on theory of pragmatics, it could be concluded that the use of Balinese language modality in text of traditional village regulation was not merely demanded by syntax and grammatical semantics. It can be proven with deletion technic. Up on the modality deletion, it did not change the prime meaning of text, but the sentences were still grammatical instead. The use of modality was motivated with pragmatic needs, i.e. performing hegemony politeness in accordance with the sense of modality as interpersonal rhetoric.

Pragmatic Knowledge and Its Reflection in ESP Textbooks: The Case of Unauthentic Textbooks

Textbooks play a crucial role in language teaching particularly in English as a foreign language (EFL) classrooms since they are considered as an important and primary source of linguistic input. EFL textbooks are expected to develop EFL students’ knowledge, no difference in linguistic or pragmatic competences (Gholami & Mahboobrezaei, 2011). As some scholars believed pragmatics is the fifth skill in language learning, then, it is essential to incorporate it like an integral component of EFL textbooks. However, there exists little knowledge on how well pragmatic perspectives of language are taken into consideration in expanding EFL textbooks generally and Iranian English for specific purposes (ESP) textbooks particularly. In fact, ESP textbooks are written by non-native authors and are considered as unauthentic textbooks. This study, therefore, attempted to explore pragmatic knowledge incorporation into ESP textbooks that have been published for computer engineers by SAMT publication as university textbooks. This study was also an attempt to investigate the frequency and rate of ‘politeness principle’ and ‘irony principle’ from the subcategories of inter-personal rhetoric as the umbrella term in two textbooks in the field of psychology. Book A was an authentic book written by natives for native speakers; however, book B was written by Iranians writers for Iranian university students (SAMT book). This paper then presented some results abstracted from the whole research project. EFL teachers and researchers whose professional and academic interests lie in syllabus design and ESP field may benefit from the findings of the study.

BASIC TENETS OF RHETORICAL PRAGMATICS

This study tackles the basic tenets of Rhetorical Pragmatics. It starts with a brief idea about Rhetoric; its relationship with Dialectics, Communication, and Pragmatics. The study adopts Leech's(1983) model of communication which involves explaining Interpersonal Rhetoric with its components: the Cooperative , Politeness, Irony and Banter principles. An idea concerning Textual Rhetoric is also presented by this work through highlighting some of its significant aspects and principles. The paper also deals with rhetorical pragmatic strategies, types of arguments, figures of speech and tropes. The paper ends up with a brief idea about Strategic Maneuvering in argumentation.

Basic Tenets Of Rhetorical Pragmatics

This study tackles the basic tenets of Rhetorical Pragmatics. It starts with a brief idea about Rhetoric; its relationship with Dialectics, Communication, and Pragmatics. The study adopts Leech's(1983) model of communication which involves explaining Interpersonal Rhetoric with its components: the Cooperative , Politeness, Irony and Banter principles. An idea concerning Textual Rhetoric is also presented by this work through highlighting some of its significant aspects and principles. The paper also deals with rhetorical pragmatic strategies, types of arguments, figures of speech and tropes. The paper ends up with a brief idea about Strategic Maneuvering in argumentation.

The Therapeutic Role of Language in HIV/AIDS Diagnostic Counselling: A Pragmatic Appraisal

This paper evaluates the pragmatic relevance of counsellor-client interaction in pre and post HIV/AIDS diagnostic counselling. The study establishes to what extent the observation of pragmatic principles either improves or impairs the diagnosis and treatment of this dreadful disease. The analyses reveal that participants involved in counselling flout or uphold the interpersonal rhetoric as well as employ speech acts and implicature in encoding and decoding utterance meaning as the case may be. However, the obliquity arising from hedged performatives does not undermine meaning due to contextual factors. The language employed by the participants is, to a large extent, pragmatically adequate and therapeutic as it disposes both the HIV positive and negative clients counselled to respond to the perlocutionary effects of the utterances. This pragmatic appraisal becomes imperative given that “a mere knowledge of technical vocabulary, and even the ability to use that knowledge correctly, are worth nothing, as long as the pragmatic conditions governing the useof that knowledge are not met” (Mey, 1993, p.300).

Politeness strategies in academic digital discourse

The paper explores the discourse strategies used in academic discourse in the informal setting of a personal web page. The aim is to study a digital variation of academic discourse that blends features of spoken and written academic discourse. It typically provides spontaneous responses using direct ways of expressing ideas. Unlike scholarly discussions at conferences, academic etiquette and diplomatic language are not always maintained and personal attacks and emotive statements occur; participants tend to express their preferences, professional standpoints, ideas and personal attitudes frankly and openly. Expressing criticism and disagreement, the participants may or may not use politeness strategies to mitigate face-threatening responses. Mapping the variety of these strategies, I work with those parts of academic web pages that are devoted to vivid and uncensored discussions of the subject matter. The analysis is theoretically rooted in the conception of interpersonal rhetoric as defined by Leech (1983). The research draws from a corpus of articles and related responses randomly chosen from personal and institutional academic web pages.

Discourse construction of social power: interpersonal rhetoric in editorials of the China Daily

Based on systemic functional linguistics, and especially newly developed appraisal theory, this study uses editorials from the China Daily to investigate patterns of interpersonal rhetoric devised to construct and shape public opinion. Attitudinal lexis and modal expressions are examined separately with the object of discovering how editorials communicate their evaluation of their subject matter. This article contends that the author of an editorial is more likely to be explicit in evaluating events and implicit in evaluating behaviour and that he/she seldom attributes attitudes to other sources. Modality occurs frequently in editorial discourse. Modal expressions of certainty, necessity and obligation (as realized by will, should, need to, have to, must) are particularly common and indicate the authority and power nature of the discourse. Modal expressions of obligation/necessity normally occur at the end of the text in order to make the most powerful possible appeal to the reader.

What discourse goals can be accomplished by the use of hyperbole?

Although hyperbole is a ubiquitous means of discourse, its role in interpersonal rhetoric has been examined to a much lesser extent than that of metaphor or irony. This paper investigates what discourse goals can be fulfilled by hyperbole, using conversations from some classic Hungarian films as the data. The reason why film conversations were selected is that the knowledge of the story and the transparency of the characters' intentions make the understanding of communicative motives easy. Besides, the situations in feature films are very similar to spontaneous everyday interactions. Analyses demonstrate that hyperbolic utterances convey the speakers' attitudes, either real or only presented, towards the topic of conversation. According to the social psychological laws of public behaviour, the expression of emotional relation or attitude is mostly subordinated to the speaker's attempt to construct an intended impression on conversational partners. Thus, the use of hyperbole has two main goals: to express emotions and to reach a desired self-presentation.

Ads as news stories, news stories as ads: The interaction of advertisements and editorial texts in newspapers

The article starts out from the prototypical descriptions of strategic goals of news writing (news values, top-down processing) and advertising copy (as suggested by the AIDA formula). Though somewhat dated, these goals are still prominent in the minds of readers and consumers, and they reflect the underlying principles of CREDIBILITY (for news writing) and DESIRE (for ads). Focusing on hybrid examples (ads imitating news stories, news stories integrating advertising elements), which are submitted to a detailed analysis, the urge for credibility and the arousal of desire are identified as the driving forces behind cross-genre imitation in ads and news stories respectively. Although the interaction is most spectacular between ads and news stories, it is no less common between ads and other newspaper genres, such as expert interviews and feature articles (e.g. environmental features, travel features, shopping features). Going beyond the level of applied analysis, the article further evaluates the CREDIBILITY and DESIRE principles against the background of Grice's maxims and Leech's interpersonal rhetoric and concludes that they take up aspects of these concepts not covered by current relevance-theoretic interpretations.

The Content of Narrative Discourse in Children and Adolescents after Early-Onset Hydrocephalus and in Normally Developing Age Peers

The development of narrative content was studied in 100 children aged 6-15 years (49 with early-onset hydrocephalus and 51 age-matched controls) by analyzing transcripts of oral texts produced from their narrations of two fairy tales. In relation to those of their age-matched peers, the narratives of the children with hydrocephalus were less cohesive and less coherent. They conveyed less of the content needed for the narrative message, included more referentially ambiguous material, included uninterpretable or implausible content, and were more verbose and less economic in quality. In relation to their age-matched peers, then, children with hydrocephalus produce narratives that are difficult to process, unclear, uneconomic, and less fully elaborated for meaning. These data add to an emerging body of information that shows children and adolescents with early-onset hydrocephalus to be at risk for several types of discourse and pragmatic impairments. The language of children with hydrocephalus is discussed with reference to the theoretical distinction between interpersonal pragmatic conventions and constraints relating to textual rhetoric (processability, clarity, economy, and expressivity). By showing impaired textual rhetoric coexisting with apparently preserved interpersonal rhetoric in individuals with developmental anomalies of brain development, the present data provide some support for a functional dissociation between the two classes of pragmatic constraints.

The Pragmatics of Politeness and Pauline Epistolography: a Case Study of the Letter To Philemon

Through a case study analysis of Paul's letter to Philemon using the framework of Geoffrey Leech's interpersonal rhetoric, this paper suggests that the techniques of modern linguistic pragmatics—in particular politeness theory-constitute a valuable approach to the Pauline writings by directing attention to the ways in which the relationship between the author and his addressees have affected the linguistic expression of ideas. The paper demonstrates that in Philemon considerations of politeness have significantly affected the way in which Paul makes his request. It is suggested that the analysis of other epistles by this method may pay important dividends for exegesis.

Physician--Patient Communication as Interpersonal Rhetoric: A Narrative Approach

The medical interview is identified as a rhetorical situation in terms of its qualities of intentionality, strategy, relationship, and transaction. This article explores the ways in which patients and physicians shape their discourse in attempts to persuade, that is, gain cooperation from, one another. The accumulating literature on narrative theory, including that of Fisher, Donnelly, Cassell, Brody, and Kleinman, is reviewed as a promising rhetorical approach. Based on this body of theory, a narrative analysis of a doctor-patient encounter is used to demonstrate the utility of this perspective in interpreting and assessing the dynamics of the medical encounter as rhetoric. The methodology used is discussed in terms of generalizing its application to other medical interviews.

Rhetorical sensitivity recast: Theoretical assumptions of an informal interpersonal rhetoric

Since it was introduced in 1972, the concept of rhetorical sensitivity has generated much interest among communication scholars. However, the theoretical assumptions underlying the concept remain unarticulated. This essay identifies the assumptions implicit in the concept of rhetorical sensitivity and examines how these assumptions extend traditional rhetorical thought in useful ways to interpersonal communication.