Argumentative Strategies and Multimodality in Oral Business Discourse: From Theory to Practice

AbstractThis study looks into how the argumentative structure (van Eemeren et al., 2007) is enhanced by verbal and non-verbal modes (Kress, 2010) in oral business discourse. A close examination of a project management introductory training session has revealed that changes in argumentative moves are strongly reinforced by the repetitive use of certain gestures and metaphoric images rendering the training talk a highly effective communicative event. The results of the analysis have been exploited to design a Master's course module focusing on the interpretation and acquisition of multimodal argumentative strategies in academic and professional contexts