Forensic Linguistics: Power and Asymmetrics in the Nigerian Courtroom Discourse

Abstract

There is power asymmetry in courtroom discourse. Courtroom professional such as judges, magistrates, lawyers and prosecutors have power over the defendants and witnesses. This paper attempts to provide an explanatory account of linguistic communication between legal professionals such as lawyers and prosecutors and the witnesses, with a view to showing the power relevant in the court room discourse. To this end various forms of questions such as WH-questions, alternative questions, yes/no questions and declarative questions are analysed to account for the discursive practices between the lawyers/prosecutors and witnesses. One of the key suggestions of this paper is that narrative mode is indispensable in the fact-finding process, which explains propositions and presuppositions are strong weapons for the lawyer in controlling, convincing and persuading the witnesses to endorse their ideas. The analysis carried out in the paper suggests the fact that lawyers maintain tight control of courtroom discourse.