Lourdes Méndez Monasterio: estrategias discursivo-argumentativas e imagen social de una mujer en el Congreso de los Diputados

Abstract

The Congress of Deputies is a site of ideological conflicts where the dominant type of interaction is based on verbal aggression and the intensification of the discourse. Traditionally, these characteristics have been considered typical of male speech, whereas feminine speech has been qualified as more attenuated, polite and indirect. Actually, aggressive or intensified forms can mark even female communication, especially in political environment. This paper wants to demonstrate it by analyzing Lourdes Méndez Monasterio’s discourses, a woman that, in the Congress, stands out for the way she plays her role of deputy, attacking her opponents and defending her political party. In this way, she also creates an image of herself as a good and valuable politician. The methodology of this paper is based on Pragmatic Linguistics, the Theory of Argumentation and the studies about social image.