Rhetorical Strategies of Legal Arguments in Courtrooms

Abstract

Within courtrooms, law cases are supposed to be won or lost. The criterion upon which this happens is entirely based on the use of rhetoric by attorneys. The rhetorical ability of speakers determines to a great extent where the legal case is going. Based on this assumption, this research paper attempts to investigate the rhetorical strategies of legal arguments in the courtroom, by offering extensive discussions to the different levels of rhetoric employed within courtrooms. These include the lexical level, which focuses on the use of lexis; and the pragmatic level, which sheds light on the intended meaning targeted by courtrooms participants. The main objective of the study, therefore, is to explore the way rhetoric is used to achieve persuasion within courtrooms. Findings reveal that legal rhetoric can linguistically be manifested and practiced within courtrooms at the lexical and pragmatic levels of the linguistic analysis, which in turn demonstrates the integrated connection held between the ideological use of language and law.