2009 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Research on the german polemical documents in the age of Reformation from the viewpoint of linguistic pragmatics.

Research Project

Project/Area Number	19520368
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Research Field	Linguistics
Research Institution	Musashi University
Principal Investigator	NITTA Haruo Musashi University, 人文学部, 教授 (00012443)
Project Period (FY)	2007 – 2009
Keywords	言語学 / 独語 / 社会語用論 / 論争 / 修辞的手段 / ドイツ近世 / 宗教改革運動
Research Abstract	Both Catholic theologians such as Johann Eck and Protestant theologians such as Martin Luther tried to write impressive and effective polemical documents by using various means of rhetorics. However, Catholics usually made use of indirect expressions with irony because of their superior social position, whereas Protestants attacked often their opponents with rough and direct expressions in order to defeat the Establishment. Furthermore, while Protestants regarded it as important, to enlighten and agitate common people, they wrote documents, which were easy to understand for lay people, but Catholics lacked such idea and they thought, that common lay people should not be introduced to theological discussion.