Argumentar em tempos de crise no Parlamento português

Abstract

The parliament is a place of political action. This enables argumentation and promotes the diversity of opinions and political positioning, reinforcing dissent. This paper analyses the way argumentation on crisis is constructed by participants in parliamentary debates. For several years, the present political and social situation in Portugal has been determined by instability. The main cause is certainly the economic turmoil that turned out to be the core of a broader and everlasting state of crisis and instability, intensified by the arrival of the “troika” to Portugal in 2011. In this context, the use of aggressive parliamentary language seems to have become a preferred strategy of verbal confrontation to aggravate the negativity of the crisis and radicalize the relationship between the interlocutors. In order to study the construction of the discursive argumentation of crisis, it is stated as main hypothesis that hyperbole is a central mechanism on this process.