Words On Trial - Can Linguists Solve Crimes

Words on Trial -
Can linguists solve crimes?

FORENSIC LINGUISTICS
• FL is the application of linguistic knowledge, methods

and insights to the forensic context of law, language,
crime investigation, trial, and judicial procedure
• relatively new subfield within applied linguistics
Three main areas of application
1. Language of written legal texts
2. Language of legal processes
3. Language of linguistic evidences
+1: crimes of language

1. Language of written legal texts
• Law is codified in, and later mediated

through, language
• Without language, there is no law
• The language of law is very different
from everyday language
↓
This often results in disadvantages for the
ordinary user
2. Language of legal processes
• Language is the medium of communication

between law enforcement authorities and
suspects/witnesses
• Also the medium of legal argumentation in the
courtroom
1. Interactions between police officers and
suspects
2. Vulnerable populations as witnesses or
defendants
3. Faulty court interpretation
3. Language of linguistic evidences
• Forensic linguistic evidence is any type of

text (spoken, signed or written) that can
be used in a criminal investigation or as
evidence in court
Forensic text types
• Social media texts

• Emergency calls
• Text messages
• Ransom demands or
other threat
• Audio recordings
communication • Death row
• Police records, statements
confession • Wills, suicide
statements letters
Linguists express opinions on:
• The meaning of
• The confusability words and
of rival trademarks expressions
• The authorship of • The place of origin
documents of asylum seekers
Crimes of language
• Solicitation • Blackmailing
• Conspiracy • Hatespeech
• Bribery • Verbal sexual
• Perjury abuse
• Defamation • Spreading ‘fake
• Threatening news’ -
• Plagiarism disinformation
Discussion part/Questions
• Which are the most interesting

language crimes in your opinion
and why?
Historical retrospect on FL
• Jan Svartvik (1968) - “The Evans Statements: A Case for Forensic
Linguistics”
• Australia (1980) interpretations of 'the same language’
• Conference of the Federal Criminal Police Office - Germany (1988)
• University of Birmingham (1992) – the first course
• Cardiff University (1999) - first MA course
• Centre for FL (2008) Birmingham’s Aston University
Dr. Jan Svartvik
• One of the world’s most productive
linguists in the field of English linguistics
and corpus linguistics
• A Comprehensive Grammar of the English
Language, A Communicative Grammar of
English, English: One Tongue, Many Voices
• He coined/invented the term “forensic

linguistics” in: “The Evans Statements: A
Case for Forensic Linguistics” →
→ to describe his application of standard
analytical and quantitative methods in
linguistics to a forensic issue
The Evans case
Timothy John Evans (20 November 1924 – 9 March 1950)

-posthumous pardon in 1966-
Evan’s family
John Reginald Halliday Christie (8 April 1899 – 15
July 1953)
Rellington place 10
Rellington place 10
Sentences from Evan’s 1st
statement
“I want to give myself up, because I have disposed of my wife.”

“She was incurring one debt after another, …”
“I have been cautioned by Chief Inspector Jennings, …”
“I have been obligated to…”
• What is your opinion?
Common misconceptions about FL
• It has nothing to do with handwriting

analysis
• It includes no form of psychological
evaluation or profiling
• Psychological profiling ≠ sociolinguistic
profiling
• No evaluation of whether a person is ‘telling
the truth’ or not
Most common issues
Nr.1: Legal disputes over trademark
• Author Identification
• Linguistic Profiling
• Text-Typing
• InterTextuality
Associations and societies
• The International Association of Forensic Linguistics

• The Germanic Society for Forensic Linguistics
• The International Association for Forensic Phonetics and Acoustics
• ALIAS Technology
FL in Hungary
• Ránki Sára
• Teacher of Hungarian language and
literature and Forensic Linguist
• Hungary’s first linguistic profiler
Choose a case!
• A – The ‘Unabomber case’

• B – The ‘Derek Bentley case’
Theodore Kaczynski
• Born May 22, 1942
• American domestic
terrorist, anarchist, and
former mathematics
professor
→ Issued social critique opposing industrialization while

advocating a nature-centered form of anarchism
→ Between 1978 and 1995, he killed 3 people and injured 23

others in an attempt to start a revolution by conducting a
nationwide bombing campaign targeting people involved with
modern technology
Derek Bentley
• 30 June 1933 – 28 January
1953
• English man who was

hanged for the murder of
a policeman
• The trial was hugely

controversial even at the
time
QUESTIONS
• What is the job of a Forensic Linguist?

• What are the most common issues/cases where FL is needed?
• Can you name some language crimes?
Other interesting cases
• Chris Coleman case (US)
• John Edward Robinson (US) – the
internet’s first serial killer
• Derek Bentley case (UK)
• Gable Tostee case (Australia)
THANK YOU FOR YOUR
ATTENTION!
SOURCES
• https://www.researchgate.net/publication/314426867_Forensic_Linguistics_An_O
verview_of_the_Intersection_and_Interaction_of_Language_and_Law
• https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272372434_Forensic_Linguistics_A_Bri
ef_Overview_of_the_Key_Elements
• https://tale-forensiclinguistics.org/honorary-fellows/jan-svartvik-phd/
• https://www.thetext.co.uk/word-crime3
• https://uwelingo.wordpress.com/2013/03/03/forensic-linguistics-top-ten-tradema
rk-cases/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txGATQany2A&t=845s
• https://www.thetext.co.uk/word-crime3
• https://www.thetext.co.uk/Evans%20Statements%20Part%201.pdf
• https://lama.hypotheses.org/70
• https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/228596015.pdf

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Words on Trial -

Can linguists solve crimes?

• FL is the application of linguistic knowledge, methods

+1: crimes of language

• Law is codified in, and later mediated

• Language is the medium of communication

• Forensic linguistic evidence is any type of

• Social media texts

• Which are the most interesting

• He coined/invented the term “forensic

Timothy John Evans (20 November 1924 – 9 March 1950)

“I want to give myself up, because I have disposed of my wife.”

• It has nothing to do with handwriting

Nr.1: Legal disputes over trademark

• The International Association of Forensic Linguistics

• A – The ‘Unabomber case’

→ Issued social critique opposing industrialization while

→ Between 1978 and 1995, he killed 3 people and injured 23

• English man who was

• The trial was hugely

• What is the job of a Forensic Linguist?

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