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Forensic linguistics has become an often used method on profiling and solving crimes on TV, well known in multiple series, from Criminal Minds to CSI or Monk. However, the real discipline behind this somewhat sensationalist approach is indeed often used to solve serious crimes. It analyzes language in a law context, for example as evidence or in legal discourse, from establishing authorship of anonymous letters or hate mail to discovering the persons responsible for terrorist threats or establishing the authenticity of documents, from wills to texts or emails. It draws upon multiple other linguistic approaches such as sociolinguistics (e.g. establishing genre, register, style, gender or power relationships), corpus linguistics (using online databases), discourse analysis and pragmatics (investigating conversation organisation, humor, paralanguage or idiosyncratic language features) as well as diachronic linguistics, lexicology, graphology and cryptolinguistics. It is a highly interesting career option for students of linguistics. who want to work in an applied legal field.
The seminar will provide a general introduction to the discipline and look at key issues and applications. Participants will select a research focus and investigate forensic linguistic questions with the help of applied examples and discuss issues related to forensic case work. A list of topics for presentations will be available in the first seminar session. The accompanying tutorial offers students the opportunity to further explore the topics discussed in the seminar. Near the end of the semester, a paper conference will be held to make sure students are headed in the right direction with their term papers. For detailed course requirements please also consult the respective module descriptions.
Please note that there will be an optional research methods tutorial in week two of the semester (prospective date: Friday, 30 October, 13-16). Attendance is strongly recommended! |
