The Language of Defamation Cases
Roger W. Shuy
Abstract
This book shows how linguistic analysis can be useful to lawyers on either sides of defamation lawsuits. It gives a brief overview of the parts of defamation law that linguistics can address, and then illustrates how phonetics, grammar, semantics, speech acts, pragmatics, conveyed meaning, and lexical choices were used in eleven defamation cases. The book also assesses what progress has been made from the early days in which language disputes were settled by bloody duels to the modern days of their replacement by libel and slander lawsuits.
Keywords: defamation, libel, slander, phonetics, grammar, semantics, pragmatics
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2009 | Print ISBN-13: 9780195391329 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: February 2010 | DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195391329.001.0001 |
