ABSTRACT
This chapter defines Dialogic Literary Argumentation and outlines some of its key principles. Dialogic Literary Argumentation asks us to consider not only what it means to be human, but also who gets to be acknowledged as fully human and treated with all the rights and respect that follow. Dialogic Literary Argumentation invites teachers and students to understand argumentation and argumentative writing about literature as a process of socialization. Socialization is not a linear process. Dialogic Literary Argumentation is built on a shift in how argumentation and writing an argument are defined. Dialogic Literary Argumentation views the tensions that get created when diverse rationalities come together in a classroom discussion as an opportunity for everyone to deepen their understanding of a literary work and their explorations of what it means to be human together in a particular time and place.
