A CDA Study Of Conflict Talk Between Lay Litigants And Judges

Chinese civil trial regime is basically inquisitorial. The controversies held by the parties to the litigation are often reflected in the conflict talk with the court. Therefore, the conflict talk between parties and the court is frequent in Chinese civil trials. In view of Conversation Analysis, the presiding judge can restore the order of the court and guide the trial process in the will of the court by resorting to the control of turn distribution, interruption and overlap.Generally speaking, litigation representatives can understand the intentions of the court during the conflict talk when the court resorts to the control of the turn distribution, interruption and overlap. But lay litigants often fail to cooperate with the court during the conflict talk with the court, which leads to inefficiency of the trial and dissatisfaction of lay litigants.This thesis adopts the Fairclough's CDA framework to analyze the conflict talk between the court and lay litigants owing to the role conflict of lay litigants. First, peculiarities of the conflict talk between lay litigants and the court are pointed out. Then we argue that the court does not deal with the conflict talk with lay litigants properly. Finally, we explore the proper way for the court to deal with this kind of conflict talk.We hope that the discussion of conflict talk will be conducive to a more efficient and more democratic civil court in China. If lay litigants have a more satisfactory experience in participation of civil trials, they will be more ready to accept judgments of the court.