engleski

Rational Argumentation in Irrational Discourse: Argumentative Techniques of Verbal Charms and Folk Prayers

By concluding that our communication with the supernatural is achieved (not exclusively) by the procedures governed by common sense, it is logical to introduce argumentation in the study of verbal magic. The influential twentieth- century definition of rhetoric as “the use of words by human agents to form attitudes or to induce actions in other human agents” given by K. Burke is followed by the remark that this basic function of rhetoric is certainly not “magical”. Burke’s definition comes close to the traditional definitions concentrating on “persuasion” although Burke views “identification” as a requirement of persuasion. Nevertheless, the argumentative view which connects rhetoric with the ability to find the appropriate means of persuasion remains predominant and is by many considered as paradigmatic. A rhetorical perspective is necessary because argumentation as a communicative practice can best be understood and adopted through its rhetorical features. Although there are many definitions of argumentation which can be used as the starting point, probably the most complex one is the following, made by the leading argumentation theorists of the pragma-dialectic approach: “Argumentation is a communicative and interactional act complex aimed at resolving a difference of opinion with the addressee by putting forward a constellation of propositions the arguer can be held accountable for to make the standpoint at issue acceptable to a rational judge who judges reasonably”. At first, it seems that this definition is not applicable to the verbal charms because they essentially rely on the belief in the magical power of words and therefore they have been treated traditionally as a form of irrational discourse which emphasizes the role of sound patterning and nonsense words. Indeed, the common use of nonsense and “magical” words is the main stylistic feature of this folklore genre, but nevertheless there are many signals of rational argumentative techniques employed for the purpose of achieving the desired effect (verbal charm as a peformative speech act in terms of pragmalinguistics). The paper is concerned with detecting, describing and evaluating the segments in verbal charms and folk prayers which could be qualified as employing argumentation techniques. These techniques are the appeal to authority, reasoning by analogy and the abusive argumentum ad hominem. The insights were acquired by examining one large corpus of Croatian folk prayers, verbal charms and folk prayers with charm elements (269 texts), the collection gathered by Friar Stanko Petrov in the first half of the twentieth century. All three types of texts were analyzed and they serve as illustrations further in the paper.

analogy ; argumentation ; authority ; folk prayer ; magic ; rhetoric ; Toulmin's model ; verbal charms

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