Adding limits to argumentative reconstruction: the case of taste in argumentation

Abstract

This paper questions the use of the argumentative reconstruction technique as a criterion for identifying arguments. To perform this, I stress a type of argument that appeals to taste. I proceed as follows: first, I relate such a technique to the ways in which pragma-dialectics and informal logic have defined argumentation. Second, I present some borderline cases to reconstruction technique such as argumentation through directives, expressives and commissives speech acts, narrative argumentation, and visual argumentation. Third, I add to these cases that of an argumentation that appeals to taste by analyzing a dialogue. Fourth, I conclude the article by offering reasons to study cases such as the one presented and by introducing some problems derived from the present study.