Looking at debate as a genre from a broad perspective of the rhetorical situation allows us to see it as a communicative act organized by a particular causative subject. This generic component will be of crucial importance when analyzing temporal aspects of shaping discourse. Each participant is allotted equal time moreover, this time should be long enough to allow both parties to present their full arguments. From the perspective of this methodological proposal, attention should be paid to the second condition of the real debate. Auer posits that argumentative interactions which do not meet these conditions should be called pseudo-debates. According to Jeffrey Auer’s definition, the debate is “(1) a confrontation, (2) in equal and adequate time, and (3) of matched contestants, (4) on a stated proposition, (5) to gain an audience decision”. In the study I propose to use a generic frame of reference to define the final pre-election debates as entities of repetitive structure formed in the social and communicative space which organizes the interaction between the actors. The most extensive material which constitutes the frame of reference for the research proposal focusing on the temporal aspects of debate comes from the analysis of Polish final debates in the years 1995, 2005, 2007, 20. In contrast, the study of time management by the actors participating in the interaction requires that the analyses consider the problem from the perspective of the strategies used by these actors and their individual ways of modeling the discourse in a given rhetorical situation. Speaking of temporality associated with the genre, we refer to rhetoricity of time shaped by tradition and rhetorical potentiality of organizational solutions ( dispositio ) related to this genre. To analyze discourse from this angle means to identify and diagnose the timing of its different elements and stages, as well as assess the impact of the subject strategies on the formation of discourse. The term “rhetoric of time” refers to the method of modeling the discourse of pre-election debate (as well as any other media event ) from a perspective of temporal categories. The debate comes and lasts at a given time, it is received in time, the participants comply (or not) with the rules of time, and, finally, they make use or lose their time. Having analyzed a number of debates, I have realized the importance of the category of time as a descriptive category characterizing their discourse at various stages. The interpretative approach proposed in this article falls within the area of rhetorical methodology. There appear diverse methodological approaches analyzing linguistic, political, marketing, and rhetorical and media aspects of debates. Parallel to these developments, the scope of prescriptive research also expands. Each year more and more countries organize the final TV debates, those with a status of a media event. They take place in television studios, universities or other public venues and differ in the number of candidates debating, their format and duration. Depending on a country, debates take various forms. Often referred to as the focal points of the campaign and miniature campaigns, they electrify the viewers’ attention like the Champions League or the Olympic Games. Rhetoric and Communications E-Journal, Issue 19, October 2015,, įinal pre-election TV debates are media events, which attract millions of viewers. Keywords: rhetoric of time, final pre-election debates, media discourse, election campaign, electoral strategies. Finally, the elements shaping the temporal orders of particular categories were discussed. Three temporal categories were identified: the time related to the situation of the debate as a genre with specific communicative functions the time of rhetorical strategies used by the actors participating in the debate and the time of direct interaction between the actors. Its aim is to draw attention to formative and meaning-oriented properties of temporal categories in shaping / studying media discourse. Warswo University, The article is a methodological proposal referring to the study of pre-election TV debates.
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