Now in its third edition, this practical introduction to forensic linguistics is required reading for students of language and the law. It includes:
new chapters on identifying forensic texts and important interactional aspects of the language used in legal contexts
an additional chapter on forensic phonetics by Harry Hollien, a world renowned forensic phonetician
an appendix of forensic texts for student study, and even more exercises and suggestions for further reading
a companion website with a repository of statements, notes and examples referred to throughout the text.
Introduction.
Part I: Language as Forensic Evidence
1. The road to authorship
2. The author constructed
3. Time, variation and genre
4. Range of variation
5. Textual Variation
6. Forensic phonetics
7. Cybercrime
Part Two: Dealing with linguistic Evidence
8. Forensic texts
9. Forensic transcription
10. Forensic authorship in practice
11. Investigating author variation in naturalistic data
12. Forensic linguistic evidence in court
Part Three: The legal process: Language and the law
13. Power in legal contexts: The courts
14. Power in legal contexts: The police
15. Vulnerable witnesses
Part Four: Language of the law
16. The law and us
17. The language of statutes
Appendix 1: Forensic texts
Appendix 2: Exercises and exercise commentaries
Appendix 3: Active researchers in the field of the forensic linguistics
Bibliography
Author Index
Subject Index
