ABSTRACT
Interlocutors must decide to engage in an interpersonal argument for the interaction to be recognizable as an argument at all. One person can complain, or challenge, or assert, but only if this conversational move is understood as creating a slot for an argumentative response can interlocutors see an opportunity for arguing. The second person’s response is what joins, and thereby creates, an interpersonal argument. The pragma-dialectical theory of argumentation (van Eemeren & Grootendorst, 2004) specifi es that a completed critical discussion will have had four stages: confrontation, opening, argumentation, and concluding. The fi rst stage involves the mutual recognition that the two parties have different positions and the second stage negotiates the method of arguing and deciding about the issue. From there, the participants argue and fi nally conclude. Even though the four stages are present in a completed episode, there is no necessity that participants actually move through the whole system. They can abandon the process at any point. This essay addresses what is perhaps the fi rst key decision: the second party’s choice of whether to engage in an argument or not, given that s/he perceives that one is possible.
