ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the strategies used by the participants to criticize their opponents and to present their own positions. The examination of controversy has been of particular interest to those concerned with the sociological analysis of academic text. Emphasis is placed on arguing that evidence needed to support the others’ narrative is missing. The participants criticize each others’ positions directly, they attempt to refute and falsify each others’ arguments and conduct the debate, not through ironic rhetoric but through direct confrontation and occasionally through what has been referred to as the academic sneer. Criticism can also be mitigated by praise, but Myers argues that this is unusual in academic articles. The main act affecting negative face in academic writing is the making of a knowledge claim, which, Myers argues, is threatening in that it imposes restrictions on what the rest of the community can subsequently do.
