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Investigating the targeted use of (dis)agreement in leave to appeal decisions of the HKSAR appellate courts: a corpus-assisted discourse analysis

  • Meng Ye

    Meng Ye is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of English and Communication at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Her primary research focus encompasses corpus-assisted discourse analysis, professional communication and media discourse.

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    and Jamie Mckeown

    Jamie Mckeown is an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at the City University of Hong Kong, where he primarily focuses his research on legal discourse, specifically in the field of law and courts. In addition, he also undertakes bespoke projects related to media discourse and professional communication.

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Published/Copyright: November 10, 2023

Abstract

This study explores the use of targeted (dis)agreement by judges in leave to appeal decisions of the HKSAR appellate courts. This is achieved by applying proclaim (i.e., pronounce, concur, and endorse) and disclaim (i.e., deny and counter) of Appraisal theory and a typology of discourse targets (i.e., General, Responsive, and Specific). The study identifies significant frequency differences in the use of targeted (dis)agreement between a corpus of grant and a corpus of dismissal decisions. Amongst other things, the findings show that, in grant decisions, judges used a greater amount of General proclaim (i.e., pronounce) to convey how applications satisfied the relevant legal requirements. Contrastively, in dismissal decisions, judges used a greater amount of General/Responsive proclaim (i.e., endorse and concur) to express agreement with the lower courts, case law, and general principles of law (which essentially functioned as rebuttals to the arguments submitted by applicants). General concur was also used to highlight general legal principles so as to classify current cases negatively. The present study also examines the impact of targeted (dis)agreement on outcomes (i.e., grant or dismiss). The findings demonstrate that General/Responsive proclaim and General/Responsive disclaim acted as independent predictors with either a positive or negative influence on the outcomes. The implications of these findings are discussed in the final section of the study.


Corresponding author: Meng Ye, Department of English and Communication, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, China, E-mail:

Funding source: Hong Kong General Research Fund Project

Award Identifier / Grant number: 15611022

About the authors

Meng Ye

Meng Ye is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of English and Communication at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Her primary research focus encompasses corpus-assisted discourse analysis, professional communication and media discourse.

Jamie Mckeown

Jamie Mckeown is an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at the City University of Hong Kong, where he primarily focuses his research on legal discourse, specifically in the field of law and courts. In addition, he also undertakes bespoke projects related to media discourse and professional communication.

Acknowledgments

The work described in this paper was fully supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No. 15611022).

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Received: 2023-06-20
Accepted: 2023-10-10
Published Online: 2023-11-10
Published in Print: 2023-12-15

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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