Recently, forensic linguistics has been an arena of significance in many fields of study especially in judicial systems, legal and forensic matters, investigation, and open-source intelligence across the globe. The term typically refers to legal and professional analysis of recorded or written language by experts (forensic linguists) to provide expert and correct interpretation. It is particularly used in legal matters especially in the court and criminal justice systems. In the court system, forensic linguistics is heavily applied to examine language evidence – either recorded in voice or handwritten in civil matters or crimes. The analysis or examination is carried out for two major reasons. First, the analysis is utilized when relevant investigations are carried out with a focus to help in identifying witnesses or suspects in specific cases or scenes, or the determination of the significance of writing or utterance to a case. Secondly, forensic linguistics plays a pivotal role when written or spoken language samples are presented to a court as evidence. In such contexts, forensic linguists provide expert testimonies of correct interpretation of the samples. As such, language analysis is significant in any judicial matters and systems provided the questionable language constitutes crimes. In most cases, crimes such as threats, hate speech, bribery, hate literature, coercion among others necessitate the use of a linguist expert for correct and most importantly professional interpretation. Evidently, the concept of forensic linguistics is ascribed to provide the truth from recorded speeches or voices and written languages in the face of a crime or relevant legal investigation matters. This paper will posit on the different ways and methods that forensic linguistics is applied to investigate and provide professional interpretation of recorded and written languages in evidentiary and investigative contexts.
Light and Shadow in Hate-Speech Cases: A Forensic Linguistics
