Aspects of Dialogic Syntax in some Debates of Imam Jafar Al-Sadiq (PBUH)

Dialogic syntax, in its general meaning, refers to the structure of engagement between words in a dialogue. Such engagement requires a certain structure that can be described as a coupling one and has links among the linguistic units. In other words, there is a clear relation between utterances whether they are spoken or written, near or far, direct or indirect. Two key aspects of dialogic syntax to be addressed here are parallelism and resonance. Parallelism articulates a relation of structural similarity between two or more stretches of discourse; for example, between pairs of utterances. Resonance can be defined as the activation of affinities across utterances. Resonance is a property of relations between elements, and as such cannot be attributed to any element in isolation. In this paper, some questions are in need to be answered: (1) How do the dialogic syntax aspects work? (2) What are the most common Danes’ Thematic Progression techniques used in Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates? (3) What are the main functions that dialogic syntax have? To answer these questions, the paper aims at: (1) shedding light on how aspects of dialogic syntax work, (2) clarifying how Danes’ thematic progression techniques are used in Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates, and (3) identifying the functions of the aspects of dialogic syntax in Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates. Due to these aims, the following hypotheses are set: (1) dialogic syntax aspects work successively in Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates, (2) Some Danes’ techniques for the description of the thematic progression can be applied to Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates, and (3) there are certain functions that Imam Al-Sadiq’s debates use.