From plot to thesis: argumentativeness in comic strips discourse about the pandemic

Abstract

Based on an expanded approach to argumentation (Amossy, 2011; 2018; Charaudeau, 2008; 2016; and Emediato, 2022), this work proposes a reflection on the argumentativeness which is inherent to discourse, considering its different levels of manifestation and, mainly, the intentionality of the communicative act. A group of comic strips was chosen as corpus, due to the critical content and pendulum movement of this discursive genre in relation to the information-capture axis typical of media. Assuming a tendency to capture the reader to lead him/her to reflection, we maintain that the texts analyzed present an intermediate level of argumentativeness, because, despite not being explicitly argumentative in their formal configuration – which would correspond to a prototypical argumentative aim –, they do more than just directing the reader’s gaze, as Amossy (2011) proposes. Therefore, the analysis focuses on the hybrid enunciative organization, in which a short-narrated plot structures the argument and supports an implicit thesis around the topic at hand – the covid-19 pandemic in Brazil.