How we argue about the use of images

Abstract

Abstract This paper is about argumentative exchanges in which two or more parties disagree about the appropriateness of the use of images (e.g., press photographs, drawings, pictures, and other visual elements) in argumentative contexts. We label such argumentative exchanges as metavisual disputes. In the first part of the paper, we develop this notion by employing theories in the philosophy of language, specifically Plunkett’s notion of metalinguistic disputes (2015) and Mankowitz’s propositional account (2021). In the second part of the paper, we illustrate the phenomena of metavisual disputes by analyzing two tweets relating to the migrant situation at the Polish-Belarusian border in 2021–2022. We argue that the viewers’ perspective characterizes a metavisual dispute in which they evaluate the use of images in the tweets by raising particular criticism against it.