Opposition in the discourse of argument

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dc.contributor.authorShahin, Kimary N.en_US
dc.date.accessioned2024-08-15T18:21:32Z
dc.date.available2024-08-15T18:21:32Z
dc.date.copyright1989en_US
dc.date.issued1989
dc.degree.departmentDepartment of Linguisticsen_US
dc.degree.levelMaster of Arts M.A.en
dc.description.abstractThis thesis examines the discourse of argument in terms of 'opposition' as a 'generic feature ' . The presence of 'opposition' in argument is explored in order to see how it makes argument speech activity a coherent and distinctive event. 'Op­position' is found to operate on three discourse levels in argument. These are the Interactional , Topic and Sentence levels. 'Opposition' is located in talk wherever the Formulation/Decision (F/D) speech act pair occurs on these three levels, and where the Decision of the act pair is a disconfirmation (D-). A F/D- pair thus rep­resents disagreement in discourse. Argument is defined as 'disagreement to disa­greement'. On the basis of this definition , argument is located in talk wherever a F/D-/D- speech act sequence occurs on the three levels of discourse. An analysis of argument discourse data reveals the exact nature of the F/D-/D- sequence on each of the Interactional, Topic and Sentence Levels of dis­course. These three sequences together present the full F/0-/D- sequence of argu­ment. A method of analysis is developed by which this full sequence may be tracked and explained. Explaining t his sequence in valves determining the rela­tionships between all acts in the sequence. Once these relationships are deter­mined, the process of an argument is explained. Based on the findings of the data analysis, certain observations on argument are made. These concern, among other issues, the use of illocutionary force (found in indirect speech) and of Rhetorical argument in argumentative discourse. In addition, the analysis reveals that the substantive basis of arguments which are 'had' is argument which is 'made' (the explicit or implicit claims or reasons produced by speakers). It is concluded that the coherence and distinctiveness of argument discourse is due in large part to the presence of the feature 'opposition'. It is tentatively claimed that argument without the feature 'opposition' will not occur. Thus, opposition may well be the essence of argument.
dc.format.extent121 pages
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1828/19637
dc.rightsAvailable to the World Wide Weben_US
dc.titleOpposition in the discourse of argumenten_US
dc.typeThesisen_US

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