From the Editors 

The year has been eventful. Two 
Germanies became one while Manfred 
Kienpointner was preparing his invited 
review of the literature in Germany and 
Austria. There is so much interesting work 
being done in the German language that 
we thought readers would be well-served 
by a report about it. Dr. Kienpointner's sur-
vey is masterfully thorough and succinct. 
We thank him on behalf of all our readers. 

As argumentation is subject to ever-
closer inspection, conventional wisdom is 
increasingly challenged. How many have 
taught the distinction between linked and 
convergent arguments with slight unease? 
There's something intuitively plausible 
about it, yet not all cases seem to fit it 
neatly. In their articles, Robert Yanal and 
David Conway independently address the 
problem. In his article Michael Gilbert 
offers a procedure for identifying the 
position of the interlocutor in argument 
conceived dialogically. 

Readers with long memories will recall 
that way back in XU we announced an 
"Argument Evaluation Contest," with a 
cash prize of $100 going to the winning 
submission. At last we publish the results. 
Congratulations to the winners. And here-
with a new contest. See inside for details. 

We have reviews of a monograph and 
of a textbook. Charles Willard, well-
known among the speech communication 
scholars interested in argumentation, pub-
lished a few years ago his theoretical con-
ception of argumentation. David Zarefsky 
gives us a review. And Richard Feldman 
reviews Larry Wright's 1989 textbook for 
courses in reasoning. 

Notices 

Since the disagreement between David 
Hitchcock (VII.2&3), Roger Smook (X.3) 
and Hitchcock & Rolf George (XIII.l) has 
already taken up its share of these pages, 
we have regretfully declined Professor 
Smook's request to field another sally. But 
it is only fair to point out that Smook 
believes Hitchcock and George have not 
refuted his position, and he is prepared to 
support that claim. 

We have a new e-mail address, and 
encourage those correspondents who can 
to save time, money and the environment 
by using it to contact us. (Sorry, we still 
must have manuscripts in hard copy.) That 
address: infolog@ucc.uwindsor.ca 0