Language and the Law: Investigating Linguistic Evidence in Jordanian Courts

Abstract

The intersection between language and the law has been attracting much attention in recent years. Yet, this intertwined relationship is still glossed over in several regions including the Arab world (Rosenhouse, 2013). Drawing upon data from audio-recorded semi-structured interviews with 34 participants specialized in the fields of law and linguistics, this study delves into the mechanism used in the investigation and proof of linguistic evidence in Jordanian courts, and how language-related cases are handled in the Jordanian courts. The sample of the study was comprised of judges (n= 6), public prosecutors (n= 5), lawyers (n= 6), investigation police officers (n= 5), handwriting analysis experts (n= 6), speaker recognition experts (n= 2), law academics (n= 2) and linguists (n= 2). The collected qualitative data were transcribed and analyzed adopting Braun and Clarke’s (2006) six-stage thematic analysis. The results showed that written and spoken linguistic evidence is examined and analyzed by experts who have no knowledge of linguistics. They cannot provide cogent reports based on convincing and accepted linguistic principles, which leads to a weakening of the argument of linguistic evidence.