`Oh', Irony and Sequential Ambiguity in Arguments

This article is concerned with the production of argumentative talk. Attention is focused on a particular device for `being argumentative', in which a turn is constructed using the marker `Oh' followed by a hearably ironical proposition. Analysis uncovers the structural aspects that contribute to that device's hearability as argumentative, and goes on to consider how an utterance deploying the device comes to be produced in terms of its surrounding, unfolding sequential context. The article thus addresses some distinctive resources available to disputants to construct their positions in the light of previous moves in the argument; and explores the way in which the sequential patterns of disputes themselves play a role in the making of arguments.