Search results for "Rhetorical question"
showing 10 items of 77 documents
Out of a creative jumble of ideas in the middle of last Century: Wiener, interdisciplinarity, and all that
2015
Is Biophysics an interdisciplinary science? In order to answer this rhetorical question, it can be useful to look back at history of disciplines, as well as that of the scientific institutions helping their development. In this contribution some aspects of the unusual hodgepodge of concepts involving Biophysics, the legacy of Cybernetics, cognitive science and the central figure of Norbert Wiener are presented and discussed.
Książę Niccola Machiavellego jako przykład zastosowania toposu zakulisowości
2019
Aby wyjaśnić fenomen popularności Księcia Niccola Machiavellego, należy wskazać na osobliwy sposób komunikowania się autora tego dzieła z czytelnikiem. Autor przedstawia siebie jako fachowca z dziedziny sztuki politycznej, za swoich czytelników zaś chce mieć jedynie tych, którzy, jak on, znają się na rzeczy. Charakterystyczny zimny i, z pozoru przynajmniej, nieozdobny styl, jakim posługuje się autor Księcia, podkreśla dodatkowo profesjonalny i nieosobisty stosunek pisarza do przedmiotu jego rozważań. W kategoriach teorii retorycznej taki sposób komunikowania się daje się opisać jako poszukiwanie okrężnych dróg do tego, co Kenneth Burke określał mianem konsubstancjacji retorycznej. Mówca sta…
Graphic emotion: a critical rhetorical analysis of online children-related charity communication in poland
2019
This study explores dominant applications of graphic affordances in a sample of children-related charity appeals collected from the official websites of nine prominent Polish foundations in late 2016. It provides a systematic description of salient typographic and iconographic resources and an assessment of their rhetorical potential to solicit donations. The analysis focuses on three dominant discursive strategies used by charity communicators, namely how graphic affordances project utility (logos), confidence (ethos) and engagement (pathos). The article offers a critique of strategic emotional stimulation through aestheticized imagery and infantilizing graphics that replace arguments with…
Constructions of Agency in Accounts of Drunk Driving at the Outset of Semi-Mandatory Counseling
2015
Convicted drunk drivers, in accounts of their offenses, rarely display qualities of agency that would contribute to a favorable outcome in counseling. Instead, the discursive and rhetorical aim of the accounts is often to evade responsibility and ownership of the offending behavior. Such disclaim of personal agency can be achieved in various ways in the narration of drunk driving (DD) incidences. This study examined how five aspects of agentic presentation (reflexivity, historicity, intentionality, causal attribution, and relationality) were present in or missing from such accounts. It was found that a tentative model of (non)agentic display based on those five aspects could differentiate b…
Rhetorical Questions as Orator’s Means of Addressing the National Spirit of Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians in Presidential Speeches
2020
Retorika kā pārliecināšanas māksla kopš Aristoteļa laikiem, īpaši pēdējā gadsimta laikā, izpelnījusies kritiskās diskursa analīzes pētnieku uzmanību. Retoriskie jautājumi kā viens no politiskajā diskursā lietotajiem retorisko līdzekļu veidiem tiek škietami par zemu novērtēti, it sevišķi situācijās, kad runas mērķis nav skaidri redzama argumentācija, pārliecināšana vai manipulācija. Attiecīgi retorisko jautājumu slēptā doma enkurojas dziļāk diskursa uztveres procesā un tādējādi atmiņā tiek uzglabāta ilgāk. Pētījumā analizētas 175 Baltijas valstu prezidentu runas, kas sniegtas dažādos nacionāli svarīgos brīžos kopš Latvijas valsts neatkarības pasludināšanas vai neatkarības atjaunošanas Lietuv…
Chapter 2. On the dynamicity of evidential scales
2018
Four Potential Meanings of Double Negation
2016
The figurative use of double negations (not uninteresting, not unhappy) has been described by linguists and rhetoricians with regards to the rhetorical figure litotes. Both mitigation and strengthening have been proposed as aims of litotes (Horn, 1989; Krifka, 2007; van der Wouden, 1996). An analysis of the construction nicht un-adjective (not un-adj.) on the basis of German corpora leads to a coherent system of pragmatic functions for this sort of double negations. The construction can function as denial, potential presumption denial, mitigation or understatement. Nevertheless, litotes exemplifies the “indeterminate nature of figurative meaning” as suggested by Colston/Gibbs (2012: 259) in…
On the relation of irony, understatement, and litotes
2016
The aim of this paper is to clarify the distinctive and the shared features of the three phenomena: irony, understatement, and litotes. These rhetorical figures have been defined as synonymous, distinct or overlapping in various accounts. This indicates an interrelation but also a need for clearer definitions. Here, each of these rhetorical figures is defined via two jointly necessary conditions. This approach sharpens the categories, enables clear-cut distinctions and helps to explain cases of overlap. German corpus data and examples from the literature as a basis, allow differentiating between cases of understatement as a means of irony, and cases of litotes as a means of understatement. …
Discourse Analytic Study of Counseling Sessions in Stroke Physiotherapy
2006
Studies on the interaction between physiotherapists and patients during treatment sessions have found low levels of communicative participation by patients and lack of direct influence by patients on the content of their treatment. This article reports the results of 7 counseling sessions in which physiotherapists and patients with stroke and their caregivers discussed the patients' postural control and balance, which had been tested and videotaped at different stages of the rehabilitation process. The physiotherapists' discourses relating to the videotaped test performances were either brief comments on the patient's performance or critical appraisals with references to difficulties encoun…
The popularization of plate tectonics: presenting the concepts of dynamics and time
1996
There have been many attempts to describe and represent the theory of plate tectonics to laypeople. In the context of a study conducted at the request of a museum, we have tried to determine how the concepts of both geological time and the movements of the plates have been reformulated. After having systematically studied in detail publications aimed at more or less educated readers, we have selected a corpus of twelve articles from nine different magazines or journals. Among the different means of expression used by the popularizers, rhetorical figures constitute a significant resource. Procedures based on analogy (metaphor, comparison, analogical reasoning) were brought together in a sing…