Analysis of the Argument Culture Essay

The Argument grow is a persuasive potentiometervas written by Professor Deborah Tannen. As a professor of linguistics at Geor press deliver University, Tannen hump in language leads her to write many books in this field. Tannen uses The Argument Culture testify to persuade her audience that this inns way of flavour at reckon come ons an adversarial frame of mind (Tannen, 305). Three of Tannens principal(prenominal) points include polarized views in the news, the use of contend metaphors by media to catch the contributors eye, and even off in the language mankind uses in everyday life. Tannens essay in any case includes different ways to look at these each of these situations that may help reduce the debate language that this society uses every day.The low example Tannen sh ars is how this society assumes the best way to solve anything is through debate. Tannen explains, this society believes the best way to cover news is to acquire spokes race who express the virtu tout ensembley essential, polarized views and present them as both placements of the story (305). In some circumstances these interviews magic spell into very heated debates with both sides yelling over the new(prenominal) to acquit their point heard. These heated debates only divides the audience into sides and closes minds to the facts on the other side of the debate.Most Ameri drive outs do not have these strong opposing viewpoints on an issue until they are influenced by the debates in the news. Instead, Tannen encourages newscasters to ask What are the other sides? (308) Asking this question impart get them thinking astir(predicate) all of the different points of view they can report on. Then the newscasters can beseech guests from multiple differing viewpoints to discuss the issue. Having a group discussion with differing less extreme viewpoints can help defuse opposition, encouraging a discussion format instead of debating the issues at hand. The audience can then de velop their own opinion on the issues at hand. The next example Tannen shares is how the media uses fight metaphors to ferment our thinking. A few of these war metaphors are the war on drugs, the war on cancer, the battle of the sexes (305). These metaphors are used to catch the attention of the evidenceer and to get the reader to pick a side.This is not always a good thing. Sometimes these metaphors are a great way to get support such as the war on cancer, because the more people that help fight this war the better chance cancer can be defeated. The media needs to decide to use war metaphors where it will encourage support insteadof encouraging debate. An example of a war metaphor that encourages debate is the battle of the sexes, because this metaphor only pits the sexes against each other. There is enough try for equality between the sexes without the so called battle. Men and women should be working unitedly to reach their goals instead of competing against each other to re ach their own goal. .A walk down the magazine isle at any memory will prove Tannens point that nearly everything is framed as a battle or game in which winning or losing is the main concern (305). Another important point Tannen brings up is the force-out of words to shape scholarship (306). It is amazing how easy it is to change how things are perceived by just changing one word in a sentence. The example she shares to prove this point is from an experiment Psychologists Elisabeth Loftus and John Palmer performed. In the experiment two groups of people watch the same movie of a car accident. The two groups are asked essentially the same question keep out one sentence uses the word bumped and the other uses smashed to describe the collision.Tannen explains those who read the question with smashed tended to remember that the cars were going faster (306). Americans need to be aware and on the lookout for these circumstances because that one word can mean the difference between dialo gue and debate. Everyone needs to understand how substantially language can change a persons perception of a situation because, as Tannen shares, language invisibly molds our way of thinking about people, actions and the world around us (306). In The Argument Culture essay Tannen tries to open eyes to the American tradition of debate. This is very important because the aim culture pervades every aspect of Americans lives today (305).As Tannens head start main point informs the reader, the argument culture is especially evident when ceremonial occasion the nightly news and being bombarded by debate. Through Tannens examples of war metaphors she proves that the media uses these metaphors to encourage disputes. War metaphors can also be establish in Americans everyday conversations it is particularly used to emphasis or even exaggerate a point in a conversation. This also shows how the language that is used in describing a situation changes ones perception of the said situation. T annens essay should be read by everyone living in this argument culture so their eyes will be open to the adversarial frame of mind (305) that can be found in this society. Then maybe this argument culture can find creativeways of resolving disputes and differences (305) without debate.Works CitedTannen, Deborah. The Argument Culture. The Prentice star sign Guide for College Writers. Ed. Stephen Reid. 10th ed. Boston Pearson, 2014. 305-09. Print.