Multimodal argumentation: a theoretical-methodological proposal

uma proposta teórico-metodológica

Abstract

This paper aims to demonstrate that the argumentative dimension of a text can be made by the strategic use of different modalities, showing a theoretical and methodological perspective for the analysis of multimodal argumentative texts. This phenomenon in which diferente modalities are employed in the co-textual plane, delas with the interlocutor’s persuasion, we call argumentative multimodality. In light, above all, of the theoretical assumptions of the Semiolinguistic Theory of Discourse, by Patrick Charaudeau, who understands discourse as the use of language situated in a socio-historical context, associated with studies that take the image as an object of analysis (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006 [1996]; Santaella, 2012), we will try to present reflections and analyzes that discuss how the iconic material, in media texts, not only illustrates the verbal content, but conveys a cohesive and coherent whole with a strong argumentative content, seeking to guide the reader to certain conclusions, excluding others. For this qualitative research, we carried out a literature review of argumentation and multimodality, uniting the two notions in analyzes of diverse media texts that make up our corpus. In the end, we show how multimodality can be used as argumentative strategy and we describe three analytical categories that can be used in the analysis of multimodal texts that have an argumentative dimension.