Epistemic architectures of texts

On the linguistic description of the interfaces between discursive formation and individual plausibility judgments

Abstract

In the article, I propose that considering established concepts from text linguistics, such as propositions and text worlds, more systematically can be fruitful for a discourse pragmatic analysis that aims to describe knowledge constitution. Drawing from the model proposed by Werth (1999) in his text-world theory, I introduce the concept of epistemic architecture and demonstrate its usefulness by closely analyzing two texts from the discourse on pesticide use in Germany. The analysis shows differences in the integration of relevant propositions into the epistemic architecture that can be interpreted as meaningful when trying to understand discursive knowledge constitution.