The Grammar of Conceptual Moves: Making the Hidden Structure of Scholarship Visible

Conceptual moves, such as drawing a distinction, turning a binary into a continuum, splitting one dimension into two, or crossing categories into a matrix, are among the most consequential acts in scholarship, yet they remain largely tacit. Scholars learn them by absorption, rarely articulate them, and recognize them in fragments scattered across disciplines. Building on accounts of rhetorical moves, Davis's index of the interesting, Kelley's philosophy moves, and Alvesson and Sandberg's problematization, this article proposes a transdomain grammar of conceptual moves. It identifies eight basic moves; distinguishes the recursion, specialization, and compounds built from them, including moves on relations, value, time, and metaphor and a family of synthesis moves; proposes checks for which combinations work, with crossing as a rule of composition; and offers three dimensions for judging whether a move is apt: structural coherence, warrant, and contribution. Diagnostic moves, which check texts for conceptual errors, are sketched as procedures for parsing a text. The article explains why moves stay tacit and why some go unrecognized as contributions, and it closes with a research agenda for testing the grammar's completeness, distribution, combination checks, impact, and difficulty.