The backlash and the construction of the woman’s discursive ethos

Abstract

The present study aims to conduct a rhetoric argumentative comparative analysis between two newspaper reports, publicized in two different communication means, that publish and disclose the same scientific research. We intend to identify the various argumentative strategies used on both reports in the characterization of the contemporaneous woman, making use of the three rhetorical proofs - ethos, pathos and logos – in the wake of the studies developed by Amossy (2005, 2011), Charaudeau (2008) and Galinari (2012, 2014). It’s also intended to relate this discursive ethos to the concept of backlash, such as used by Faludi (2001). Within such conception, backlash is understood as a reactionary speech against the female emancipation arisen in the last decades. The analyses featured in the present article derive from an excerpt of our master’s dissertation.