ARGUMENTATION

Definitions

• It is defined as the art of influencing others, through the medium of reasoned discourse, to believe or act as we wish them to believe or act. It is the process of influencing the belief or behavior of a hearer or reader through spoken or written speech by supplying him with reasons and stirring his feelings.
• Argumentation is a verbal or written, social and rational activity aimed at convincing a reasonable judge of the acceptability or inacceptability of a standpoint by advancing a certain constellation of propositions which is designed to justify or refute the standpoint.
• Argumentation theory, or argumentation, embraces the arts and sciences of civil debate, dialogue, conversation, and persuasion; studying rules of inference, logic, and procedural rules in both artificial and real world settings.

Methods and Approaches

• Conviction- appeals to reason, to create belief or intellectual agreement. It is that phase of argumentation whereby the arguer directs his words to the reasoning faculty of man.
• Persuasion- appeals to the emotion, feelings and to the will. It is the phase of argumentation whereby the disputant directs his words to the heart, to the feelings, to the sentiments, to the emotions.

Aims/Objectives/Components

• The study of argumentation concentrates on the analysis, evaluation and presentation of the 'point of departure' and the 'organization' of argumentation. The point of departure consists of all explicit and implicit premises and assumptions that are taken as the starting point in argumentation. The organization of the argumentation comprises the way in which the various reasons are connected with each other and the standpoint at issue to justify or refute this standpoint. Both in the study of the point of departure and in that of the organization of argumentation logical and pragmatic considerations play a part.

• The philosophical component of the study of argumentation involves reflection on the ideal of reasonableness underlying the theorizing about argumentation; the outcome of this reflection is pertinent to the question of when argumentation may be considered sound or not sound.
• Toulmin’s Model:

Ø The Claim-Most general statement, the umbrella statement that all other parts have to fall under. The main point of the argument which can be express or implied.

Ø Data- provides the evidence, opinions, reasoning, examples, and factual information about a claim

Ø Warrants - are assumptions, general principles, conventions of specific disciplines, widely held values, commonly accepted beliefs, and appeals to human motives. Most warrants are not stated in an argument.

Ø Backing - is audience specific and it bridges the gap between the author's warrant and the audience's opinion.

Ø Rebuttals - establish what is wrong, invalid, or unacceptable about an argument and they may present counter arguments or new arguments that represent different points of view.

Ø Qualifiers - are words throughout the argument that quantify the argument. Some examples include: always, never, is, are, all, none, and absolutely, always and never change to sometimes, is and are change to may be or might, all changes to many or some, none changes to a few, and absolutely changes to probably or possibly.

References:

• The Art of Argumentation and Debate by Africa
• http://courses.durhamtech.edu/perkins/toul.html
• Definition of Argumentation, Interpretation, Rhetoric
• Wikipedia