In:Persuasion in Specialized Discourse: A multidisciplinary perspective
Edited by Chiara Degano, Dora Renna and Francesca Santulli
[Argumentation in Context 22] 2024
► pp. 211–231
Chapter 10Teaching to manage implicit linguistic meanings
The state of the art and future perspectives
Published online: 25 October 2024
https://doi.org/10.1075/aic.22.10giu
https://doi.org/10.1075/aic.22.10giu
Abstract
Conveying information implicitly can reduce epistemic vigilance and critical attention. Commercial advertising and
political propaganda often exploit this property of linguistic implicitness to covertly convey questionable content, leading
to the manipulation of their audience. This highlights the necessity of educating individuals to recognize implicit content
and to critically engage with it, a practice that has not been sufficiently emphasized thus far. The paper provides a survey
of (i) the primary theoretical and experimental studies on the subject and (ii) some educational resources and materials
currently available to the public in Europe, aimed at enhancing awareness regarding the cognitive and social ramifications of
implicit information transmission, particularly through the media. The paper also offers (iii) specific didactic proposals
based on the authors’ research and teaching experiences.
Article outline
- 1.Implicitness as a persuasion device
- 2.Research on education about implicit communication
- 3.
Educational resources
- 3.1Research projects and Observatories
- 3.2Public Service Platforms
- 3.2.1BBC Bitesize
- 3.2.2Rai Scuola
- 3.2.3Lumni
- 3.2.4General results of the overview
- 3.3
Some ideas to increase awareness about implicit meanings
- 3.3.1Comprehension
- 3.3.2Production
- 4.Conclusions
Notes References
References (41)
Brocca, N., Borowiec, E. & Masia, V. (2020). Didactics
of pragmatics as a way to improve social media literacy: An experiment proposal with Polish and Italian students in
L1. heiEDUCATION
Journal,
5
, 81–107.
Brown, P. & Levinson, S. (1987). Politeness:
Some universals in language usage. Studies in Interactional
Sociolinguistics, 4. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bruno, K. J. (1980). Discrimination
of Assertions and Implications: A Training Procedure for Adults and
Adolescents. Journal of Educational
Psychology,
72
(6), 850–860.
(1981). An
investigation of cognitive processes that mediate inferring in persuasive text. Ph.D. Thesis, Kansas State University.
Bruno, K. J. & Harris, R. J. (1980). The
effect of repetition on the discrimination of asserted and implied claims in
advertising. Applied
Psycholinguistics,
1
(3), 307–321.
Chafe, W. (1976). Givenness,
contrastiveness, definiteness, subjects, topics, and point of
view. In C. Li (Ed.), Subject
and
topic (pp. 25–55). New York: Academic Press.
Cresti, E. (1992). Le
unità d’informazione e la teoria degli atti
linguistici. In G. Gobber (Ed.), Atti
del XXIV Congresso internazionale di studi della Società di Linguistica Italiana. Linguistica e
pragmatica (pp. 501–529). Roma: Bulzoni.
Daneš, F. (1966). The
Relation of Center and Periphery as a Language
Universal. In F. Daneš et al.. (Eds.), Travaux
Linguistiques de
Prague (pp. 9–21). Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.
Gaeth, G. J. & Heath, T. B. (1987). The
Cognitive Processing of Misleading Adversiting in Young and Old Adults: Assessment and
Training. The Journal of Consumer
Research,
14
(1), 43–54.
Givón, T. (1982). Evidentiality
and Epistemic Space. In Studies in
Language,
61
, 23–49.
Greene, E., Flynn, M. S. & Loftus, E. F. (1982). Inducing
Resistance to Misleading Information. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal
Behavior,
21
(2), 207–219.
Guasti, M. T., Chierchia, G., Crain, S. Foppolo, F., Gualmini, A. & Meroni, L. (2005). Why
Children and Adults Sometimes (but not always) Compute Implicatures. Language and
Cognitive
Processes,
20
, 667–696.
Harris, R. J. (1977). Comprehension
of Pragmatic Implications in Advertising. Journal of Applied
Psychology,
62
(5), 603–608.
Harris, R. J., Dubitsky, T. M. & Thompson, S. (1979). Learning
to Identify Deceptive Truths in Advertising. Current Issues and Research in
Advertising,
2
(1), 73–91.
Harris, R. J., Dubitsky, T. M., Connizzo, J., Letcher, L. E. & Ellerman, C. S. (1981). Training
Consumers about Misleading Advertising Transfer of Training and Effects of Specialized
Knowledge. Current Issues and Research in
Advertising,
4
(1), 105–122.
Lambrecht, K. (1994). Information
Structure and Sentence Form: Topic, Focus, and the Mental Representations of Discourse
Referents. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lombardi Vallauri, E. (1993). Clausole
a contenuto presupposto e loro funzione discorsiva in italiano antico. Quaderni del
Dipartimento di Linguistica dell’Università di
Firenze,
4
, 7195.
Lombardi Vallauri, E. (1995). Tratti
linguistici della persuasione in pubblicità. Lingua
Nostra,
2
/3, 41–51.
(2021). Manipulative
Shallow Processing Induced by Presuppositions and Topics: Theoretical Perspectives and Experimental
Evidence. Frontiers in
Communication,
6
,610807. .
(2022). Distinguishing
psychological Given/New from linguistic Topic/Focus makes things
clearer. In D. Garassino & D. Jacob (Eds.), When
Data Challenges Theory. Unexpected and Paradoxical Evidence in Information
Structure (pp. 39–55). Amsterdam-Philadelphia: Benjamins.
Lombardi Vallauri, E. & Masia, V. (2014). Implicitness
Impact: Measuring texts. Journal of
Pragmatics,
61
, 161–184.
(2020). La
comunicazione implicita come dimensione di variazione tra tipi
testuali. In J. Visconti, M. Manfredini & L. Coveri (Eds.), Linguaggi
settoriali e specialistici. Sincronia, diacronia, traduzione,
variazione (pp. 113–120). Firenze: Cesati.
Lombardi Vallauri, E., Baranzini, L., Cimmino, D., Cominetti, F., Coppola, C. & Mannaioli, G. (2020). Implicit
argumentation and persuasion. Journal of Argumentation in
Context,
9
(1), 95–123.
Masini, F., Mauri, C. & Pietrandrea, P. (2018). List
constructions: Towards a unified account. Italian Journal of
Linguistics,
30
, 49–94.
Mercier, H. (2009). La
Théorie Argumentative du Raisonnement. Ph.D. Thesis in Social Sciences, Mention Cognitive Sciences, E.H.E.S.S, Paris.
Papafragou, A. & Musolino, J. (2003). Scalar
Implicatures at the Semantic-Pragmatics
Interface. Cognition,
80
, 253–282.
Pietrandrea, P. (2020). L’insegnamento
delle scienze del linguaggio al servizio della democratizzazione del dibattito
online. In A. Sansò (Ed.), Insegnare
Linguistica: basi epistemologiche, metodi,
applicazioni (pp. 97–114). Milano: Officinaventuno.
Reboul, A. (2011).
A
relevance-theoretic account of the evolution of implicit
communication
. In Studies in
Pragmatics,
13
, 1–19.
(2017). Cognition
and Communication in the Evolution of Language. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press.
Rigotti, E. (1988).
Significato
e senso”. In AA. VV, Ricerche
di semantica
testuale (pp. 71–120). Brescia: La Scuola.
