(Dørene lukkes præcist)

Bedømmelsesudvalg: 

• Professor Anders Sigrell, Lunds Universitet
• Professor Christian Kock, København Universitet
• Lektor, ph.d. Mads Haugsted, Aarhus Universitet, (formand)

Vejledere:

• Hovedvejleder: Lektor, ph.d. Nina Christensen
• Bivejleder: Lektor, ph.d. Signe Pildal Hansen

Afhandlingen udlånes på Danmarks Pædagogiske Bibliotek.

Institut for Uddannelse og Pædagogik (DPU) er vært ved en efterfølgende reception.

Abstract:
The dissertation aims to examine how ’rhetorical situations’ can be analyzed as spaces or frames surrounding rhetorical action and agency.

First is a presentation of the concept ’rhetorical agency’, followed by the argument that his concept must be viewed from two different perspectives, and that rhetorical agency is always related to some level of trust in the specific conditions. The dissertation is thus based on the assumption that the performance of rhetorical action and agency is based on conditions of trust.

Based on a theoretical discussion of the concept of the rhetorical situation, the dissertation then formulates a revised and expanded conceptual understanding of rhetorical situations, which comprises the foundation for a new approach to situational analysis. This new approach makes it possible to examine rhetorical situations as the empirically based, socially constructed and individually defined phenomena that surrounds the rhetorical act. It is argued that an analysis of a specific rhetorical situation should involve two different, but interrelated, analytical perspectives: a situation-oriented and an action-oriented. Thus, the rhetorical situation can be analyzed in its complex entirety, as a space for a rhetorical act, and for a specific rhetorical act.

The expanded situational analytical approach involves (a) a new seven-angled model that illustrates the outer structure and inner dynamics of the rhetorical situation, (b) a new conceptual construction that outlines the mediators’ individual ’strategy of action’ based on a combination of position, motivation, intention and reasoning, and (c) a new concept, ’rhetorical identity’ as a term for the mediators’ process of being or becoming in the meeting with the recipients in the actual rhetorical situation.

The analytical section of the dissertation applies the situational analytical perspective in an examination of a specific, rhetorical practice, based on eight informants' statements about the rhetorical situation and their own rhetorical practices. The analysis, which involves both the situation-oriented and the action-oriented approach, shows that the rhetorical situation in question imply three dimensions of acting, which together constitute the total rhetorical assignment connected to the specific rhetorical situation. The analysis also shows that individual mediator relates to and acts differently according to the three dimensions of acting, depending on their individual confidence in themselves, in the cause and in the recipients. The mediator’s individual situational confidence thus affects their situational understanding, their strategy of action and their establishment of rhetorical identity within the specific rhetorical situation, and thus also influences the extent and character of their personal, rhetorical agency.

The dissertation concludes that the revised and expanded situational analytical approach allows analysis of a specific rhetorical situation as a space and frame surrounding rhetorical action and agency. The situational analytical approach makes it possible initially to identify the rhetorical situation’s overall constitution and character, and to analyze individual mediator’s situational understandings, strategies of action and establishment of rhetorical identities. Thus the situational approach is a useful tool to clarify the individual rhetor’s personal grounds for rhetorical action and agency, based on his or her attitudes and confidence in relation to him- or herself, in the cause and in the receiver within the specific rhetorical situation.