A critical discourse analysis of power in lawyer: witness interaction

Abstract EN

This paper tackles critical discourse analysis in terms of power.

it examines the language lawyers over witnesses in order to detect and reveal the use of language strategies and tools as a carrier of the ideologies of power.

the researcher, therefore, uses fairclough’s (1989) three-dimensional approach as a model to analyze the targeted data.

accordingly, the study aims at finding out the asymmetric relations among the different parties of the courtroom interaction and how power manifests itself by them, determining the linguistic manifestations of power and the tools that are used by lawyers and then analyzing critically the linguistic cues and indicators most frequently yielded in such trials, which reflect power.

based on these aims, it is hypothesized that the existence of different asymmetrical relations among the different parties of the courtroom interaction, such interaction is assumed to be controlled by the powerful participants such as lawyers and public prosecutors.

this is reflected by employing different linguistic cues and indicators that reflect ideologies and degrees of power such as the different kinds and functions of questions.

it is concluded that powerful people including lawyers understand that ideologies including the ideologies of power are (re) produced, exercised and embedded through a discourse along with their discursive practice.