Language and Legal Judgments

Integrating research methods from Linguistics with contemporary Legal Argumentation Theory, this book highlights the complexities of legal justification by focusing on the role of value-laden language in argument construction and use.

Integrating research methods from linguistics with contemporary legal argumentation theory, this book highlights the complexities of legal justification by focusing on the role of value-laden language in argument construction and use. The combination of linguistic analysis and the pragma-dialectic approach to legal argumentation yields a new way of perceiving and understanding the phenomenon of evaluation, one that offers theoretical and practical gains. Analyzing a vast corpus of judicial opinions from the US Supreme Court and Poland's Constitutional Tribunal, the book paints a clear picture of complex linguistic choices made by judges to assess and support arguments in the justifications of their decisions. The book will be of interest to scholars in Law, Linguistics and Rhetoric, as well as to judges and practicing lawyers engaged in the art of argumentation.

Autorentext

Stanisaw God-Roszkowski is Associate Professor and Head of Department of Specialized Languages and Intercultural Communication at the University of ód, Poland.

Inhalt

About the Author; Preface; Part I: Introduction; 1. Evaluation. What is it, and why does it matter? 2. Evaluation, argumentation and the justification of judicial decisions; Part II: Evaluative language patterns as a persuasive device; 3. Evaluating processes and propositions; 4. Evaluating status and sites of contention; Part III: Uncovering evoked and less obvious evaluative meanings; 5. Value-based lexis and argument in morally sensitive issues; 6. Evaluative language, the Ideal Model of Critical Discussion and Strategic Manoeuvring; 7. Pulling the strands together.