Language and Dialogue - Volume 10, Issue 2, 2020

Abstract

Research has shown that Donald Trump’s rhetorical style on Twitter differs significantly during the time he was a citizen, a presidential candidate and a president (Ott and Dickinson 2019). The aim of the current study is to characterize his rhetorical style on Twitter during the 2016 presidential race, in light of its potential to influence future campaigns in the U.S. and outside, and its implications on political and public discourse. The study presents a comprehensive analysis of Trump’s Twitter habits, using statistical analyses and a content analysis of all tweets posted on Trump’s Twitter account from the date he announced his presidential candidacy until he won the election. Analysing the results using framing theory reveals Trump’s main campaigning strategies on Twitter:(a) negative campaigning against his rivals and the establishment; (b) bypassing the traditional media; and (c) self-promotion. Trump used his Twitter far less frequently to express his vision or future plans.

Abstract

This article builds on previous research on the communicational practices of the United Nations human rights monitoring system (Wallace 2017). Treaties such as those responsible for women’s and children’s rights lack direct enforcement mechanisms, so interest falls on the means by which treaty monitoring committees can encourage state compliance. The proceedings are bookended by writing (state reports and committee concluding observations), the focus of my earlier research. However, there is also an oral component, invariably characterized by the committees (but less frequently by the states) as “constructive dialogue” where the objective is “to assist and not to judge.” I explicate the structure and practices of these proceedings and find much that is justifiable, given the communicational context, but also some potential for reconsideration.

Abstract

Compliment responses are speech acts assumed to mirror cultural appropriateness. In this sense, a review of responses to compliments offers cues about the ways in which speakers react to dialogic strategies of politeness. In order to examine how Icelanders react to compliments, an Elicitation Experiment (EE) was designed to evoke natural responses. It consisted in asking a group of 81 Icelandic informants (46 female, 35 male) to read tongue-twisters in Dutch and Spanish during a set of interviews. Informants were complimented based on their performance and their responses were recorded. Based on 162 exchange tokens, it is possible to conclude that not agreeing to compliments is the most common way of reacting to compliments in Iceland.

Abstract

Although paranormal experiences have been broadly investigated, medium-sitter interactions have been studied much less. In this article, five excerpts from an Italian “public mediumship demonstration” are presented with the main aim to answer the following research questions: (1) what are the linguistic strategies used by the medium to manage her epistemic authority and by the sitters to acknowledge, strengthen, resist or contest it? (2) how do these strategies affect the sequential structure of interaction? The analyses reveal that: the medium mainly uses demonstrative questions; sitters generally confirm what the medium discloses, acknowledging her epistemic authority; when sitters do not confirm, the medium resorts to three main linguistic strategies attempting to (re)establish her authority; when the medium has to manage confirmation failures, the sequential structure becomes more complex.

Abstract

This paper focuses on three chapters about captain Yegorov and Katya Lugina in Sergei Dovlatov’s novel entitled Зона (The Zone: A Prison Camp Guard’s Story). The intertext shown and discussed in the paper suggests that the three chapters may be viewed as a ‘modified version’ of Ernest Hemingway’s WWI novel A Farewell to Arms. We then use the intertext as the basis for the discussion of Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway and the value of Hemingway’s personality and works for Dovlatov. We analyze two aspects of Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway: (1) Dovlatov’s emotional response to Hemingway’s novel and (2) Dovlatov’s contemplation of esthetics of art. In the end, we discuss the notion of tradition in connection with Dovlatov’s dialogue with Hemingway.

Abstract

This paper looks at the call for a dialogue underlying Amos Oz’s autobiographical novel A Tale of Love and Darkness.1 As a peace activist,2 Oz depicts the Arab Palestinian under Israeli military occupation as a victim and reintroduces himself as a new, unorthodox Jew. In this context, the paper approaches the author-narrator’s message calling for a dialogue with the Palestinian other, albeit through a Chekhovian solution to an existentialist conflict entangling both the Arabs and the Jews over the Question of Palestine. Thanks to the complicity between the Western Colonial Project3 and the Zionist plan to create a Jewish homeland in Palestine, most of the Palestinian population was expelled and dispossessed. Oz condemns that complicity and stands out as a Jewish voice for peace. His narrative discourse implies that he is crossing a minefield while trying to help resuscitate the current stale-mate peace process in the Middle East.

This article reviews The Dynamics of Interactional Humor. Creating and negotiating humor in everyday encounters9789027200006

This article reviews The Language of Humor. An Introduction978-1-108-403696-2