Argumentative Texts, Language Properties, Romanticism, and Linguistics
Argumentative Text: Types of Arguments
Arguments can be classified into several types:
- Data: Providing numbers or other objective information.
- Facts: Using verifiable events as evidence.
- Examples: Presenting specific, concrete cases to support or refute a claim.
- Authority: Citing direct or indirect quotations from prestigious individuals or institutions.
Noun Phrases
Noun phrases are separate statements that lack a verb phrase. They are often used in proverbs and aphorisms. Noun phrases are frequently employed in communicative situations where the sender expresses emotion or valuation, often with an exclamatory tone and quantifying elements. They appear in headlines, photo captions, advertising slogans, and stage directions in plays.
Text Properties
For a text to be effective, it must possess these properties:
- Consistency: All parts of the text must interact to convey a single, comprehensive meaning.
- Cohesion: The text must be grammatically well-connected.
- Adaptation: The text must conform to the specific communicative situation.
Standard Spelling
The relationship between sounds and spellings can be complex:
- One letter represents one sound.
- Different letters represent the same sound.
- One letter represents different sounds.
- Two letters represent one sound.
- One letter represents two sounds.
- One letter has no sound.
Romanticism: Key Features
- Individuality: Romanticism emphasized the unique individual, exalting subjectivity and personal experience. Literature focused on emotions, feelings, and the contemplation of nature.
- Evasion and Irrationalism: Romantics rebelled against contemporary society, often escaping into the past or exotic locales.
Romantic Poetry
Romantic poetry often drew on legends, historical events, and fictional stories. It was typically narrative, describing places with an emphasis on sensory details, and often used octosyllabic verse.
Themes:
- Love
- The meaning of life and human existence
- The presence of supernatural and diabolical elements
- Critique of life through marginalized characters
Key Authors and Works
- Jose Zorrilla: Known for his Legends.
- Jose de Espronceda (1808-1842):
- The Student of Salamanca: Features the arrogant legend of Felix de Montemar.
- The Devil World: An unfinished poem.
- Songs: Embodies the ideal of freedom in marginal characters and critiques society.
Romantic Prose
Larra’s articles critiqued society with the aim of reforming Spanish customs. He criticized traditions, holidays, and offered pessimistic reflections on life, often using narrative and appearing as a character in his own works.
Greek Formants
Greek formants contribute the meaning they had in classical language to the words created from them.
Post-Romanticism
Post-Romanticism featured intimate poetry focused on emotions, feelings, and reflections on nature.
Key Authors and Works
- Rosalia de Castro (1837-1885):
- Cantares Gallegos (Galician Songs): Celebrates Galician culture and popular forms.
- Follas Novas (New Leaves): Expresses personal emotion and evokes her homeland in Galician.
- En las Orillas del Sar (On the Banks of the Sar): Written in Castilian, shares personal feelings of loneliness and torment, with a fragmented rhythm.
- Gustavo Adolfo Becquer (1836-1870):
- Rimas (Rhymes): Characterized by brevity, intimacy, and musicality. They suggest emotions, avoiding ornamental poetry. They often take the form of monologues and dialogues addressed to a woman, using varied rhythms, common language, and metaphors from nature.
- Legends: Feature the supernatural world and characters representing good and evil. These prose narratives are set in various parts of Spain and in remote times, or the author’s immediate past.
- Recurring Themes:
- Love, often with tragic outcomes.
- Music, representing artistic perfection.
- Religion, often intertwined with love.