Chapter 3 Legal-lay interaction and recontextualization in Swedish criminal proceedings
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Joacim Lindh
Abstract
This study explores how language use in legal settings, particularly criminal trials, is shaped by institutional and social practices. Drawing on insights from Sociolinguistics and Critical Discourse Analysis (van Leeuwen 2008; Fairclough 2010), the research examines how Swedish courts operate through regulated practices that dictate permissible actions. In criminal cases, professionals (such as prosecutors) guide laypeople (such as injured parties and witnesses) through structured questioning. The study analyzes an assault case involving two young men, focusing on how the prosecutor adapts his questioning in court based on the preceding police interrogations. Differences between courtroom testimonies and earlier statements are often addressed through recontextualization, with prosecutors using police records to clarify discrepancies. The research highlights how social practices in court restrict laypeople’s control over their narratives, with legal professionals guiding the content. Additionally, it emphasizes how semantic differences between examinations or memory gaps can be exposed to influence the trial outcome. Overall, the study illustrates the hierarchical dynamics within courtroom interactions.
Abstract
This study explores how language use in legal settings, particularly criminal trials, is shaped by institutional and social practices. Drawing on insights from Sociolinguistics and Critical Discourse Analysis (van Leeuwen 2008; Fairclough 2010), the research examines how Swedish courts operate through regulated practices that dictate permissible actions. In criminal cases, professionals (such as prosecutors) guide laypeople (such as injured parties and witnesses) through structured questioning. The study analyzes an assault case involving two young men, focusing on how the prosecutor adapts his questioning in court based on the preceding police interrogations. Differences between courtroom testimonies and earlier statements are often addressed through recontextualization, with prosecutors using police records to clarify discrepancies. The research highlights how social practices in court restrict laypeople’s control over their narratives, with legal professionals guiding the content. Additionally, it emphasizes how semantic differences between examinations or memory gaps can be exposed to influence the trial outcome. Overall, the study illustrates the hierarchical dynamics within courtroom interactions.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgments VII
- Contents IX
- Foreword XIII
- Introduction: More than (just) words 1
-
Part I: (Just) words
-
Legal perspectives
- Chapter 1 Metalanguage in the penalty phase of a capital trial: A study of two monologic genres 27
- Chapter 2 Political discrimination or reasonable conduct? Motive-implicative discourse moves in a civil trial’s closing arguments 49
- Chapter 3 Legal-lay interaction and recontextualization in Swedish criminal proceedings 73
-
Non-legal perspectives
- Chapter 4 . . .and I’m telling you honestly, I don’t measure: Emotive reframing and evasiveness in expert testimony 99
- Chapter 5 Navigating the linguistic complexity of cross-examination: The role of the witness intermediary for an autistic defendant 127
- Chapter 6 Between semantics and pragmatics: Witnesses’ credibility and the linguistic expression of the source of information in Italian criminal trials 149
- Chapter 7 Identity construction in complainants’ narratives in the investigative public hearings on the Nigerian Federal Capital Territory administration 185
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Part II: More than (just) words
-
Speech and gesture
- Chapter 8 I wanna be somebody: Enacted reported thought in an actual jury deliberation 213
- Chapter 9 Multimodal discursive authority of the judge: Analyzing the judge’s interactions with courtroom participants in Chinese criminal trials 231
-
Image and architecture
- Chapter 10 Allegories of justice in contemporary France: In search of a new paradigm 267
- Chapter 11 Criminal law, court architecture, and the space of justice: Stakeholder perceptions of ‘special’ courts used in child sexual abuse trials in India 293
- Index 319
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgments VII
- Contents IX
- Foreword XIII
- Introduction: More than (just) words 1
-
Part I: (Just) words
-
Legal perspectives
- Chapter 1 Metalanguage in the penalty phase of a capital trial: A study of two monologic genres 27
- Chapter 2 Political discrimination or reasonable conduct? Motive-implicative discourse moves in a civil trial’s closing arguments 49
- Chapter 3 Legal-lay interaction and recontextualization in Swedish criminal proceedings 73
-
Non-legal perspectives
- Chapter 4 . . .and I’m telling you honestly, I don’t measure: Emotive reframing and evasiveness in expert testimony 99
- Chapter 5 Navigating the linguistic complexity of cross-examination: The role of the witness intermediary for an autistic defendant 127
- Chapter 6 Between semantics and pragmatics: Witnesses’ credibility and the linguistic expression of the source of information in Italian criminal trials 149
- Chapter 7 Identity construction in complainants’ narratives in the investigative public hearings on the Nigerian Federal Capital Territory administration 185
-
Part II: More than (just) words
-
Speech and gesture
- Chapter 8 I wanna be somebody: Enacted reported thought in an actual jury deliberation 213
- Chapter 9 Multimodal discursive authority of the judge: Analyzing the judge’s interactions with courtroom participants in Chinese criminal trials 231
-
Image and architecture
- Chapter 10 Allegories of justice in contemporary France: In search of a new paradigm 267
- Chapter 11 Criminal law, court architecture, and the space of justice: Stakeholder perceptions of ‘special’ courts used in child sexual abuse trials in India 293
- Index 319
