Conceptions of Speech Acts in the Theory and Practice of Argumentation: A Case Study of a Debate About Advocating

Abstract

Far from being of interest only to argumentation theorists, conceptions of speech acts play an important role in practitioners’ self-reflection on their own activities. After a brief review of work by Houtlosser, Jackson and Kauffeld on the ways that speech acts provide normative frameworks for argumentative interactions, this essay examines an ongoing debate among scientists in natural resource fields as to the appropriateness of the speech act of advocating in policy settings. Scientists’ reflections on advocacy align well with current scholarship, and the scholarship in turn can provide a deeper understanding of how to manage the communication challenges scientists face.

Should Climate Scientists Fly?

“…Originating in specific argumentative interactions and sharpened as similar interactions get repeated, sometimes these resources (to use the most encompassing term) spread through the network of arguers and are absorbed into the argumentative content knowledge underlying fluent practice in a controversy. One of our jobs as argumentation theorists is to further articulate these resources, making them even more explicit; to put them in order, linking them into coherent structures; to ground them within more comprehensive views developed in our disciplines; and when appropriate, to critique them (Goodwin 2002(Goodwin , 2014(Goodwin , 2020.…”

An Analysis of Speech Act Ability Conducted by the Students of English Department in Muhammadiyah University of Metro

“…"I promise I will come on time". (Goodwin, 2014) argued that speech act is identified as the approaches of conceptualizing of argumentative activities. This is the key concepts in in practitioners, self-reflection, on daily activities.…”

From Apes to Whistleblowers

“…Scientists are increasingly being called upon to communicate more clearly, strategically, and frequently with the general public (Bucchi, 2013; Davies, 2008; Dudo, 2012; Poliakoff & Webb, 2007; Sharon & Baram-Tsabari, 2014; Varner, 2014) through many forms of outreach (Besley, Dudo, & Storksdieck, 2015; Fischhoff & Scheufele, 2014; Sommer & Maycroft, 2008). The needs, intentions, and strategies behind scientists’ public outreach are manifold (Fischhoff & Scheufele, 2013) and reflect a variety of motives and objectives, including informing and exciting the public about science (Davies, 2008; Dudo & Besley, 2016), defending science (Fischhoff & Scheufele, 2014), building trust in scientists (Dietz, 2013; Goodwin & Dahlstrom, 2014), influencing policy (Goodwin, 2014; Sommer & Maycroft, 2008; Uhlenbrock, Landau, & Hankin, 2014), and enhancing their careers (Davies, 2008; Nisbet & Markowitz, 2015; Sommer & Maycroft, 2008). Outreach methods include being interviewed by journalists, blogging or using social media (Shema, Bar-Ilan, & Thelwall, 2012), participating in public forums, visiting schools, and producing content directly for mainstream news media in the form of opinion pieces and commentaries (Bauer & Jensen, 2011; Davies, 2008; Liang et al, 2014; Peters, 2013).…”

“…But there is scant research examining how scientists actually communicate in practice. This analysis will examine scientists’ communication approaches in newspaper op-eds through the framework of speech act theory, which proposes that communicators build trust with their audiences by taking on personal and reputational vulnerability in asserting their claims (Goodwin, 2014, forthcoming), with the ethical implication that the audience is an active evaluator of both the claim and the claim maker. Speech act theory can help both guide and explain scientists’ rhetorical moves in the public sphere, as a departure from deficit-based communication efforts.…”