Teamwork and technology, even as people are seeing their increased use in organizations, are becoming important components of problem-based learning in academic settings. Yet, fostering computer-assisted teamwork is complex and time consuming. Knowing how and when to intervene would prove useful. This study draws from the field of project…

This article reports the results of a study analyzing the interaction of administrative genres and stakeholder beliefs in the Mexican Wolf Blue Range Reintroduction Project (MWBRRP) in New Mexico and Arizona. The author examines this interaction through an analysis of a set of 944 recorded public comments (with administrative responses) concerning…

This study uses a new-to-educational-research methodology, based on the legal process, to build a case that U.S. students have been largely ignored in discussion and planning for their own, presumed futures. A variety of evidence, from two large and distinct data bases, is drawn together to show: (1) students perceive their classrooms in ways…

The need to approach knowledge and action throught the structures of language requires consideration of the forms of communication. Talk can bring out the context-bound, partial, and tentative nature of educational knowledge (as well as practical, personal, and theoretical knowledge); it can make people aware of their various commitments and help…

Challenging Weaver's view that Burke principally argued from circumstance, the author suggests that Weaver's main thesis is of a superior type of argument unrelated to specific realities of the case and that we can no longer argue from such generalizations. (AF)

Burke's rhetoric attacked the mismanagement of British India by Warren Hastings and sought to interpret India to the English by making it an extension of England. In the name of national self interest he appealed for reform. (AF)

Maintains that widening the study of argumentation to include the visual unjustifiably expands common understandings of argument, particularly those that define argument as a two-part, two-sided act. Contends that by calling pictures "arguments," it is possible that attention will be diverted away from the rhetorical functions pictures…

Considers the persuasive qualities of refutational text and explores the role of refutational text in educational settings that have competing agendas. Discusses how the use of refutation to aid learning fits into one of these agendas, and the teaching of refutation as a persuasive rhetorical device fits another. (SLD)

Examines the limits of field theory in argumentation studies, addressing several issues: whether fields are primarily logical types or organized social arenas; sources of symbolic authority within fields; and roles of description and normativity in development of field theory. Forwards P. Bourdieu's notion of social practice as an alternative that…

This study examines the effect of goal instructions on students' reasoning and argumentation in an interactive context (discussing a topic on-line). Goal instructions specify the goal of a discussion. General goals (to persuade or explore) were crossed with specific goals (to generate reasons or counterarguments/rebuttals) in a 3x3 randomized…

The paper draws on an ESRC-funded study of 70 families in two London locations. It focuses on a set of contemporary and contradictory political discourses that work on and through the lives of working-class mothers and thereby create tensions and impossibilities within their lives. We illustrate the ways in which these women are positioned by and…

Argumentation is an important skill to learn. It is valuable not only in many professional contexts, such as the law, science, politics, and business, but also in everyday life. However, not many people are good arguers. In response to this, researchers and practitioners over the past 15-20 years have developed software tools both to support and…

Recently, Bakhtinian philologists have charged scholars of education with misapplying Bakhtin's scholarship in their field. In this critical essay, Eugene Matusov reviews two recent edited collections relevant to this issue: Arnetha F. Ball and Sarah Warshauer Freedman's Bakhtinian Perspectives on Language, Literacy, and Learning and Bonny Norton…

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to examine and condense the literature on influence and persuasion. Design/methodology/approach: The article identifies basic principles of influence in the theoretical and research literature, which are supported by empirical study. Findings: Ten principles of influence were identified, empirical support…

Classical informal reasoning "fallacies," for example, begging the question or arguing from ignorance, while ubiquitous in everyday argumentation, have been subject to little systematic investigation in cognitive psychology. In this article it is argued that these "fallacies" provide a rich taxonomy of argument forms that can be differentially…