I aim to describe how teachers' beliefs and practices influence the way mathematical argumentation is conducted in lower secondary mathematics classroom within the Czech curricular context. I present results of two studies: the first one characterises the Czech curricular context, namely, the national curricular document and aspects of justification of mathematical statements in selected series of mathematics textbooks. The second study reports on characteristics of teachers' beliefs and practices as related to argumentation on an example of six purposefully selected teachers, via interviews and observations of their lessons. Finally, I select three teachers with differing approaches to teaching and describe specific observed instances in their practices in relation to classroom norms regarding argumentation, justification of general mathematical truths, and aspects of arguments. I show how teachers' beliefs, a textbook and pupils may influence the observed arguments. The studies show that a teachers' emphasis on efficiency (fulfilling school curriculum demands) on one hand and on sense-making on the other lead to distinct implemented curricula. The curricular context and teachers' practice analysis suggest that justification of general truths is generally seen as important but without clear cognitive aims...

The aim of this diploma thesis is to analyze the rhetorical profile of one of the most prominent Czech rhetors after the Velvet revolution, physician and politician David Rath. In the theoretical part, the author comprehensively processes the history of public speaking based on the ancient but still current rhetorical tradition of ancient Greece and Rome. Furthermore, the work describes all the specifics defining both the interpersonal communication itself, as well as its individual aspects - specifically, verbal, nonverbal and psychological components, along with persuasive and manipulative techniques. The practical part is co-created by two key aspects - the career and political profile of David Rath and the analysis of his speech. The theoretical basis in combination with the knowledge of the life story of the central speaker forms the basis and context for the analysis of Rath's rhetoric. On carefully selected speeches, the author then examines in detail how the observed rhetor can adapt to various situations across the communication spectrum. The researched findings can then be used for further analyses of a similar focus.

This diploma thesis focuses on an analysis of crisis communication in food retail chains, using pragmatic linguistic methods. In the theoretical part I deal with speech acts theory from the viewpoint of John L. Austin and Emile Benveniste, Grice's Cooperative Principles and the Theory of Argumentation. I use all these methods in analyzing press releases published by retail chains in the case of a negative food affair. I am therefore interested in the way those linguistic tools are used by the authors in the press releases in order to communicate most effectively in a time of crisis, so as to prevent the loss of either costumers or the good name of the company. I will also focus on the most frequent mistakes made by the authors of press releases. The aim of my thesis is to find out whether it is possible to find some repetitive mechanisms used in the communication of different crisis topics. The main hypothesis is that although there are different crisis situations which need to be communicated, communication methods used in individual press releases are similar and they often recur. Key words: pragmatics, speech acts, cooperative principles, argumentation, crisis communication, food affair, press release.

The aim of this paper is to describe the contradictions of Christian denominations, not dogmatically doctrinal, but generally doctrinal, in terms of how they arise and how they impact the thinking within the respective groups. Two churches were selected for this comparison, the Catholic Church and Jehovah's Witnesses, as representatives of the denominations with the most notable differences. The initial starting point is the history of the two churches, which highlights the cultural and historical conditions under which the two churches were formed. Further work on two cases of conflict, the concept of the Holy Trinity and access to apostolic succession, discusses the basic argumentative practices that apply to both churches. This passage shows that on this level the difference between the two communities is only minimal, the procedures applied by both are consistent. The argument is followed by the interpretative part, which deals with the search for the causes of discrepancies in the diversity of interpretations of the Bible, which was published as a joint authority of both communities from previous argumentation analysis. Finally, this work describes how the differences resulting from different interpretations are involved in the daily life and organization of the Church. A different discourse...

It is no secret that 'managerial' solutions are not, on average, nearly as reliable as 'technical' solutions. The focus of this work is to clarify the reasons why this is so, and to seek ways to increase the reliability of managerial solutions. The causes of this situation are both subjective (human factor failure), which can be influenced, and objective (complexity of the problem, the specifics of human behaviour, etc.) that can be only minimally influenced. Significant subjective causes at work were identified as: a. cognitive distortions at the mental level of thinking of the problem solvers; b. deficiencies in making inference and drawing conclusions; c. incorrect argumentation. There are two ways to reduce these causes: 1. cultivation of managerial thinking of the problem solvers; 2. the use of reserves in the implementation of approaches and tools of theoretical disciplines that already operate successfully elsewhere and are beneficial for managerial solutions. The first way deals with procedures for managerial solutions formulated in the language of the relevant discipline (the language of management), expressed by natural language and the chain of formulas (calculations) and visual (graphic) tools in the form of managerial decision trees, diagrams and charts with the rules of 'managerial logic'. This is generally defined as a set of approaches, tools, methods and skills needed for credible justification when solving managerial problems. Specifically it deals with: - the 'case-based reasoning' approach, which aims at finding the best point of view on a given problem and analysing all considered aspects within its context step-by-step in detail; - translating the tools and methods of modern logic (especially its intuitionistic version) from the language of logic into the language of management taking into account the factual content of expressive means of the language of management including the ability of their effective application; - respecting the principles of rational and ethical argumentation within managerial solutions. The second way circumvents managerial solution procedures by recasting the managerial task to the task of a scientific discipline (logic, game theory, etc.) and derives the correct result therein. In this context we talk about the use of knowledge of theoretical disciplines in management. Both of these ways are demonstrated in the work in a number of illustrative examples and the annexed case studies addressing the specific tasks of managerial practice.

This thesis is concerned with identifying and describing the linguistic elements of manipulative strategies of selected political speeches from 1948 till 1957. In the first part the work is focused on the principles of political communication, further persuasion and manipulation with respect to the relationship of these terms. In the next sections we find formal and functional description language means with regard to their pragmatic semantic components, mechanisms of propaganda and political line of reasoning. Knowledge of various aspects of language allows description of specific manipulative tendencies in political speeches and their burden in terms of evident and hidden action to the addressee.

The diploma thesis presents own research method for examination of speech formations. It focuses on examination of televised political debates. The method applied here may be characterized as an organized hermeneutic analysis of political discourse. Through the application of an analytical - philosophical approach (e.g. application of the theory of maxima, illocutionary acts evaluation, and analysis of arguments and verification of their truthfulness), the method allows us to establish objective facts of the debate as well as some personal features of debate participants. To examine texts, the theoretical knowledge of distinguished authors (J. J. Austin, K. Bayer, T. A. van Dijk, N. Fairclough, H. P. Grice, J. Habermas, J. Kraus, G. N. Leeche, J. R. Searl, and others) have been made use of. In addition to the literary survey, the thesis also includes the argumentation in respect of selection of the method, selection of talk shows, transcript of debates from TV records, transformation of the text into an analysable form, and research methodology. Accordingly, a specific communication model of programme is drawn up, the talk show discourse is analysed as a whole, and the styles and argumentation of selected participants are examined and analysed, which is followed by a comprehensive assessment of the...

Right and good : Argumentation and Discourse of Czech Activists for Women's Suffrage Jitka Gelnarová Abstract The dissertation deals with the concept of suffrage within the discourse of Czech women's suffrage activists between 1897 and 1914. The aim is to define how the concept of suffrage was constructed by Czech suffragists within the context they lived in, how their notion of the suffrage was influenced by the fact that different women were positioned differently within the system of hierarchies based on gender, class and nation. The dissertation focuses on the hierarchies present in the discourse; the relation of "public" and private" in the discourse; the notion of "political representation" in the discourse; positions the suffragists spoke from and their representation of the enemy ("us/them"); the functions the concept of "Czechness" fulfilled in relation to the demand of female suffrage in the discourse; and the relation of "universality" and "particularity" to the demand of female suffrage in the discourse.

Argumentation in interaction: The sequential structure of accounts in television debates Abstract This dissertation concentrates on the sequential structure of argumentation in spoken interaction. The point of departure is the concept of argumentation as linguistic action based on accounting for a controversial position with the purpose of convincing listeners of its acceptability or in order to defend it when it is challenged. The dissertation's specific aim is to describe the interactional context of argumentation using material from TV debates. The study utilizes ethnomethodological conversation analysis combined with elements of argumentation theory. The objects of empirical analysis are the types of linguistic action in argumentation interaction (e.g. the call for argumentation or the challenge to a position or argument) and the means of signaling argumentation. The research focuses on the analysis of the sequential organization of the TV debate, including the system of turn-taking, and on describing the sequential contexts of the argumentation in this genre. Attention is devoted to so-called argumentative sequences, i.e. series of mutual argumentative responses (problematizations) by the debate participants. Also examined are other types of linguistic action which initiate argumentation by...

The dissertation describes qualitative research undertaken to study the discovery process in a class at the individual, group and whole class levels. This process is demonstrated on the case of discovering the parity of number zero (odd or even) in two class discussions. These discussions took place in a class of fourth year pupils at primary school, taught by the author in a constructivist way, within a one month period of each other. The research database contains also audio and video recordings, written work of the observed pupils, the author's teaching diary and it is analyzed and compared with literature. The methodology focuses on classifying the broad spectrum of pupils' responses and thinking processes not only in relation to the selected problem but also to related problems. Some of the described events are commented on with recommendations how to handle the didactic situations that occurred or compared with hypothetical situations typical for transmissive teaching. The main results of this work fall in the cognitive, metacognitive and social area are summarized into seventeen points that highlight the importance of discussion for the complexity of pupils' knowledge, for the enriching and refining their ideas, increasing their autonomy and ability to cooperate.