Formal linguistics and law

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This volume explores the intersection of linguistics and jurisprudence, highlighting how formal linguistics can address many questions in the field of language and law. It begins with an introduction by the editors, discussing the innovative nature of the collection and providing an overview of key research projects. The first chapter focuses on understanding the law, emphasizing the role of semantics in clarifying legal meanings and examining the perceived complexity of legal language through psycholinguistics. Chapter two addresses the identification of criminals, showcasing how text and corpus linguistics can aid in tracing authorship of documents like blackmail letters, while phonetics and speaker identification are crucial for audio evidence. The chapter also discusses the organization of legal systems using databases and tools from computational linguistics and artificial intelligence for terminology management and legal theorizing. Chapter three presents various methods for structuring legal systems. Chapter four delves into multilingualism and law, illustrating how European legislation reflects linguistic and legal diversity among member states, with a case study on Switzerland's approach to legal drafting. The volume concludes with an index of subjects and persons.