Discourse marking mechanisms in argumentative interaction
Formal debates are a necessary discourse genre in language learning (CEFR and PCIC). One of the linguistic elements that learners must master in order to produce them is the use of Discourse Marking Mechanisms (DMMs) to guide their contributions, defend the theses held and manage the interaction. This study aims to analyse the repertoire and use of DMMs used by B2 learners in debate activities. The corpus examined consists of 12 debates (113 minutes of recording) which are analysed from a pragmatic approach using mixed methods (qualitative and quantitative). The results indicate that DMMs mainly fulfil a cognitive function and students use a basic repertoire of DMMs, which are introduced, according to the PCIC, at the initial levels. From the analysis we derive the need for the explicit teaching of DMMs linked to the debate genre.