ARGUMENTATION THEORY.

Catalog description

Emphasis on theories of argumentation and persuasion that further the rhetorical aims of convincing or achieving agreement through identification and consensus. Attention to classical and contemporary approaches to issue analysis, invention, audience analysis, building common ground, stasis theory, types of proofs and tests of validity, organizational strategies, and style. Special attention to argument on the Internet. Assignments may include constructing Web sites related to argument. Study of such theorists as Aristotle, Perelman, Toulmin, Ong, K. Burke, Brockriede and Ehninger, Bitzer, Young, Becker and Pike, and others.