April 15-16, “The 1st Symposium on Argumentation in China” sponsored by Southwest University of Finance and Economics was officially held in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan province. Professor Frans van Eemeren, honorary director of Jiangsu University Center for the Argumentation Studies, Associate Professor Wu Peng, director of Jiangsu University Center for Argumentation Studies and Ms. Yan Linqiong attended the symposium. Professor Frans van Eemeren and Associate Professor Wu Peng respectively delivered a keynote speech at the meeting.
“The 1st Symposium on Argumentation in China” was jointly initiated by Professor Xiong Minghui, a celebrated argumentation theorist at Sun Yat-sen University, the School of Humanities/School of General Education, Southwest University of Finance and Economics, and Jiangsu University Center for Argumentation Studies. The meeting is intended to gather Chinese specialists and scholars in argumentation theory, to jointly promote the multidisciplinary communion of China’s argumentation studies, to quickly sinicizing and renovating the latest achievements in international argumentation theories, and to bring the Chinese argumentation studies into the international community. The biennial platform will be held in turn by colleges and universities or institutes in China devoted to studies on argumentation. A special guest at this year’s symposium, Professor Frans van Eemeren delivered a keynote speech entitled “Pragma-dialectics: from standard theory to expanded theory”. In his presentation, Professor Eemeren introduces the development of pragma-dialectics in the past more than 40 years and the status quo of this theory, noting in particular the necessity of rhetorical expansion in pragma-dialectics and the fruitful results that have been achieved in this field. Associate Professor Wu Peng delivered a keynote speech entitled “Argumentation theory”, in which he mainly introduces the status quo of argumentation studies in the world, especially the different interpretations of the concept of argumentation, the fundamental issues concerning argumentation, the main theoretical approaches to argumentation studies and so on. At the end of the symposium, Ms. Yan Linqiong publicized the development, research achievements and the teaching practice of critical thinking of Jiangsu University Center for Argumentation Studies to the experts and scholars present at the meeting, who gave a unanimous applause to her introduction.
At this year’s symposium, the efforts that have been made by Jiangsu University Center for Argumentation Studies to promote the theoretical studies on and the spreading and localization of argumentation studies in China are well recognized by theorists and scholars in this particular field and the popularity and reputation of Jiangsu University Center for Argumentation Studies are further elevated.
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