ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights some of the important issues that have come to the fore in forensic discourse analysis and introduces some of the techniques and methods that have been employed by linguists in their capacity as ‘expert witnesses’. The issue of the ‘leading question’ is a good illustration of the sometime lack of fit between the perspectives of lawyers and the perspectives of language analysts, showing how legal understanding and interpretation is often at odds with linguistic categories and analysis. Whereas legal definitions of the concept of a ‘leading question’ are inconsistent, linguists for their part have no trouble identifying it: a leading question contains a presupposition that is embedded in a sentence in such a way as to make it undeniable or non-negotiable. The literature in forensic discourse analysis abounds with illustrations of social asymmetries, embodied by differences in dialect, linguistic skill and oral proficiency, in the two sides of an interrogation or cross-examination.
