Approaching Methods of Reasoning in Parvin Etesami's Dialogic Discourse Based on Toliman's Theory

Dialogism is a two-way exchange of ideas in which one party supports a particular action, practice, procedure, hypothesis, or theory, while the other is opposed with it and tries to overcome the others by argumentation. Parvin Etesami is considered as one major great poet in this genre of speech that has expressed her moral and social claims and advice through dialogism via allegory. The aim of this study was to identify Parvin's reasoning style in debates using Tolmen's theory. Sample argumentations were analyzed from three aspects including a. identification of arguments; b. identifying the claims and their rationales and c. the indicators of certainty. From among the thirty-two arguments (rational position) as identified in Parvin's poems, the positions of history and experience; the need for caution and prevention of danger and threat; the control of sensual desires; affordability and provision of definitions had the highest frequency. The arguments had formed the basis for claims and recommendations in areas such as chronology, cosmology, aesthetics, jurisprudence, risk caution, combating government and administrative corruption, denial of superficiality, fighting with oppression, identifying the challenges of poverty, rationalism, perfectionism, kinship rituals and companionship customs. Another finding of this research is the high frequency of certainty tokens such as "should", "should not", "nothing" and "never" in the poet's reasoning style.

  Method and Aims of the Study

     In this library research, data analysis was conducted with "inductive" techniques with the aim of examining the components of Parvin Etesami's reasoning style in the design and context of rational arguments, and the persuasion of the audience. Studies in this field include the relationship between dialogism and logic and its use as a logical argument to prove the claim and persuasion of the other party. Some instance include Vashghani Farahani and Mehri in which case, they brought “Stylistic features in Parvin Etesami's debates” or  Ebrahim Tabar’s study titled "A Stylistic Study and Analysis of Parvin's Drunk and Conscious dialogism with Rumi's Drunk and Wise Man";  Expression of dialogism and its relation with rationalism by Zakeri and Samsami titled "Sparks of dialogism in Persian Literature (rhymes)"; expressing the most official method of discussion and reasoning, as in Mohebbi’s study titled "Debate in Persian Literature"; "Sociological analysis and analysis of Parvin's poems and debates through political and social ideas", Majdaldin and ModirShaneshchi, and "Manifestation of the two principles of imitation of ancestry and ethics in Parvin's poems" by KordNowdeh. According to above-mentioned ideas, in this article, an attempt has been made to study the method of reasoning in debate based on Parvin Etesami’s works as mapped on Toliman's theory.

In the present article, the dialogic poems were analyzed in terms of three aspects including identification of arguments, identifying the claims and their rationales and finally the indicators of certainty. In all, thirty two arguments based on rational positions were identified in the poems, within which the arguments associated with cleanliness as a necessity, concentration on beauty, the balance between supply and demand, kinship interest with and obliteration by the stronger companions based on their ideas and descriptions, definitions and existing nomenclature in the literature were finally identified and extracted. In terms of frequency, history and experience, the need for caution and risk prevention, control of sensual desires and affordability had the highest frequency. Arguments for necessity and urgency, and efficiency and productivity were in the second place, and positions of honesty, coping with abuse, decompression, sequence of difficulty, and inefficiency in the third place. Rational positions, kinship interest, destiny, philanthropy, reality, responsibility, culture, work-life balance, consensus, concentration on beauty, the effects of companionship, and prohibited tendencies towards extremes were also detected. On the other hand, the above-mentioned arguments had triggered various claims such as cooperation, punctuality, maternal love and endeavor, truth seeking, denial of racism, unity, gaining experience, governmental ethics, anti-government corruption, anti-crime movements, hopefulness, challenging the poverty, rationalism, and perfectionism.  Certainty-enhancing indicators such as "should", "never", "always", "times", "unless (except)" were also frequent in her argumentative style.