Proof and Prayer: A Characterization of Ritualized Persuasive Discourse
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2008
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Swarthmore College. Dept. of Linguistics
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Thesis (B.A.)
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Abstract
In this paper, we introduce a class of discourse called Ritualized Persuasive
Discourse, or RPD. This class covers a wide range of different genres, all of which
involve an extensive tradition important to speakers in the genre and the need to persuade
an audience to agree with the speaker. The combination of these influences produces a
variety of intriguing linguistic features.
RPD covers a surprisingly diverse set of discourse types. For most concrete
examples of the principles described in the paper, we take two of the most disparate
members of the class: English-language mathematical proofs of the modern era, and
prayers of petition from the Roman, Greek, and Christian traditions, along with Navajo
holy chants (which fall intriguingly between the two).
Examining these based not on specific content but on linguistic structure and
general relationship to content, we find a number of similarities that help to define the
nature of RPD. ‘Function’-based features include context, content, and purpose of the
discourse, while ‘form’-based features deal more directly with the language used to
express it and include organizational, syntactic, and lexical points.
By this comparison of examples of RPD and the resultant synthesis of their shared
elements, we come to a better understanding of the boundaries of the class of RPD—what
makes a specific instance of discourse RPD, what features to look for in such a text, and
how to recognize those characteristics of the text stemming from its nature as RPD. We
also examine RPD’s place with reference to the study of stylistics. Investigating the
assorted members of the RPD class as related works reveals much about their individual
natures and about how we work with formal language and argumentation.