Interaction in early modern news discourse: the case of English witchcraft pamphlets and their prefaces (1566-1621)

Abstract

This investigation examines the interactional dimension of the preface section of an early form of news discourse. Informed by the framework of metadiscourse and incorporating insights from the study of stance and evaluation, this study explicates the ways in which the witchcraft pamphleteers strategically structured and designed the texts to secure readers' agreement through conceptual interaction. Differences in the selection of metadiscourse contributed to different writer identities and reflected generic conventions that occurred over time.