BhatiaApplied Genre Analysis of Legal Discourse.ppt

Applied Genre Analysis of Legal Discourse
©Vijay K Bhatia
Department of English munication
City University of Hong Kong
ABSTRACT
One of the critical aspects of legal discourse, which has been largely ignored in analytical literature, is that it is highly intertextual and interdiscursive in nature, and perhaps more so, in the context of its application to real life social happenings. Many of the currently available analytical studies, including some of my own (Bhatia, 1982, 1993), on the construction and interpretation of legal discourse have primarily focused on individual legal genres. However, in professional legal practice, such texts are rarely interpreted on their own; they are often understood and interpreted in specific contexts of negotiation of justice, which are part of legal practice and culture. This relationship between the discursive and the professional aspects of legal practice thus seems to be crucial for a critical analysis of legal discourse (Bhatia, 2004). In this presentation, I would like to highlight the nature and function of intertextuality in legal discourse, suggesting a framework for its analysis in the context of professional legal practice and culture.

REFERENCES
Bhatia, . (1982): An Investigation into Formal and Functional Characteristics of Qualifications in Legislative Writing and its Application to English for Academic Legal Purposes, . thesis, University of Aston in Birmingham.
Bhatia, Vijay K., (1993): Analysing Genre-Language Use in Professional Settings, London, Longman.
Bhatia, Vijay K., (2004): Worlds of Written Discourse—A genre-based view, London, Continuum.
THE PRESTIGIOUS PROFESSORS FORUM
GUANGDONG UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN STUDIES
Like most other discourses, Professional legal discourse also operates at several levels:
Textual
Intertextual
Genre
Interdiscursive
Professional Practice
Professional Culture
Intertextuality and Interdiscursivity
(Foucault, 1981, Bakhtin, 1986, Kristeva, 1980, Fairclough,