A Pragmatic Analysis Of Hedges And Hedging In Courtroom Arguments

By making a descriptive and qualitative analysis, the present thesis makes an investigation into hedging and hedges used in courtroom arguments. For the purpose of being comprehensive, both English and Chinese data are gathered and analyzed.Following Hyland's model (1998), the thesis is supposed to arrive at the following three conclusions. Firstly, three types of hedges will be identified, namely, accuracy-oriented hedges, speaker-oriented hedges and hearer-oriented hedges. Accuracy-oriented hedges refer to the lawyer's desire to express propositions with greater precision. This kind of hedges can be divided into attribute hedges and reliability hedges. While attribute hedges, enabling speaker to distinguish how far a result approximates to an idealized state, specify more precisely the attributes of the phenomena described, reliability hedges acknowledge the lawyer's uncertainty about the knowledge and thus indicate the confidence he or she is willing to invest in the validity of a claim. Compared with accuracy-oriented ones, speaker-oriented hedges are often associated with higher-level claims. The hearer-oriented hedges then convey the lawyer's attitude towards the hearer and the hearer's active role in the negotiation of claims.Furthermore, the analysis of the Chinese and the English data suggests that hedging in Chinese arguments has much in common with that in English arguments despite the differences in language and the legal system. Although there are some differences, on the whole they have more resemblances than discrepancies. One distinguishable resemblance, generally speaking, is that hearer-oriented hedges are used with the highest frequency in both English and Chinese courtrooms, for the reason that hearers'opinions (judges and the jury) tend to have a direct influence on the development and verdict of the case.Lastly, hedging is an essential means for the lawyers to achieve their communicative purposes in courts. Hedging in the argument enables lawyers to express claims with an appropriate degree of precision; to express their reservations concerning the personal commitment, as a protective insurance against the possibility of eventually being proved wrong; to express a particular attitude towards the hearers to invite their interest and then call on them to assent to claims, and in this way to meet expectations of deference, modesty and negotiation.It is hoped that the present study may enhance the hedging study by giving insight into the nature, linguistic strategies and pragmatic functions of hedging used in courtroom arguments.