LINGUIST List 5.1161

Sat 22 Oct 1994

Sum: Tag questions

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1. Barbara Abbott, Sum: tags in legal discourse

Last week I posted a request asking (on behalf of a student) for references
related to the use of tag questions by attorneys in courtroom situations.
Thanks to Ingo Plag, Chris Butler, Ellen L. Contini-Morava, Nancy Goss,
Gregory Ward, Sue Blackwell, Chris Nelson, and Jan Engberg for the
suggestions and references listed below.

I. Suggestions:

(1) Why not post your query on FL-LIST (Forensic Linguistics List)? There
are lots of people doing work on legal discourse there.

To subscribe to FL-LIST send a message to:

FL-LIST-REQUESTBHAM.AC.UK

To post a message to everyone on FL-LIST send it to:

FL-LISTBHAM.AC.UK

(2) One way of tracking down the studies on tag questions is by requesting
help from people on the "ethno" (short for ethnomethodology/conversation
analysis) list (ethnorpitsvm.bitnet).

II. References.

a new journal (by John Benjamins?) titled something like "forensic
discourse"

Aarhus School of Business. HERMES, vol. 9 was devoted to papers on legal
discourse, one or two of which are on pragmatic aspects. Address to
write to: HERMES, Aarhus Business School, Fuglesangs Alle 4, DK-
8210 Aarhus V, Denmark.

Arbini, R. 1969. Tag-questions and tag-imperatives in English. Journal of
Linguistics 5:205-14.

Armagost, J. 1974. Declarative tag sentences and threatening tag sentences.
University of Washington Ph.D. diss.

Birner, B. and G. Ward. 1992. On the Use and Interpretation of "and
everything". In McFarland, T. et al., eds. Working Papers in
Linguistics, Department of Linguistics, Northwestern University. Pp.
13-19.

Bungarten, ? and Jan Engberg. Forthcoming. a major bibliography on
Language, Law and Communication. It will probably come out in
summer 1995.

Cattell, R. 1973. Negative transportation and tag questions. Language
49.612-39.

Culicover, p. 1973. on the coherence of syntactic descriptions. journal of
linguistics 9:35-51.

Culicover, p. 1976. syntax. new york: Academic press.

Dale, P.S/ Elizabeth F. Loftus/ L. Rathbun:"The Influence of the Question on
the Eyewitness Testimony of Pre-school Children", in: Journal of
Psycholinguistic Research, 7 (New York 1978); 269-277

Danet, B./ K.B. Hoffman/ N.C. Kermish/ H.J. Rafn/ D.G. Stayman: "An
Ethnography of Questioning in the Courtroom", in: Shuy, R./ A. Shnukal
(eds.): Language Use and the Uses of Language. Washington 1980:
Georgetown University Press; 222-234

Danet, B./ N.C. Kermish/ H.J. Rafn/ D.G. Staymen: "Language and
Construction of Reality in the Courtroom II: Toward an Ethnography of
Questioning" (= Law and Language Project, Working Paper 5), Boston
1976: Boston University

Danet, Brenda/ Nicole C. Kermish:"Courtroom Questioning: A Sociolinguistic
Perspective", in: Massery II, Louis N. (ed.): Psychology and Persuasion
in Advocacy. Washington, DC 1978: Assiociation of Trial Lawyers of
America, National College of Advocacy

Dijk, Teun van. _Handbook of Discourse Analysis_ vol.s 1-4.

Dunstan, Robert:"Contexts for Coercion: Analyzing Properties of Courtroom
'Questions'", in: British Journal of Law and Society, 7 (London 1980);
61-77

Goldman, L.R.:"A case of 'questions' and a question of 'case'", in: Text, 6
(Amsterdam 1986); 349-392

Harris, S.:"Questions as a mode of control in magistrates' court", in:
International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 49 (1984); 5-27

Huddleston, R. 1970. Two approaches to the analysis of tags. Journal of
Linguistics 6:215-22.

Kasprzyk, D./ D.E. Montano/ Elizabeth F. Loftus:"Effect of Leading Questions
on Jurors' Verdicts", in: Jurimetrics Journal, 16 (Chicago, Ill.
1975); 48-51

Kearsley, Greg P.:"Questions and Question Asking in Verbal Discourse: A
Cross-Disciplinary Review", in: Journal of Psycholinguistic Research,
5 (New York 1976); 355-375

Lakoff, R. 1969. A syntactic argument for negative transportation. CLS 5. Pp.
140-47.

Lakoff, Robin. works on women's/powerless speech (sorry, I don't have a
ready reference for this).

Levi, Judith & ?. more recent collection of papers on language-and-law
issues.

Levi, Judith. Bibliography on language and the law.

Loftus, E.:"Leading questions and the eyewitness report", in: Cognitive
Psychology 7 (New York 1975); 560-572

Loftus, E.F./ G. Yanni:"Eyewitness testimony: The influence of the wording of
a question", in: Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society 5 (Goleta, Cal.
1975); 86-88

Loftus, Elizabeth F./ D. Altman/ R. Geballe:"Effects of Questioning upon a
Witness's Later Recollections", in: Journal of Police Science and
Administration, 3 (Gaithensburg,Md. 1975); 162-165

Marquis, Kent H./ James Marshall/ Stuart Oskamp:"Testimony Validity as a
Function of Question Form, Atmosphere and Item Difficulty", in:
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2 (Washington, DC 1972), 167-
186

Marshall, J./ K.H. Marquis/ S. Oskamp:"Effects of Kind of Question and
Atmosphere of Interrogation on Accuracy and Completeness of
Testimony", in: Harvard Law Review, 84 (Cambridge, Mass. 1971);
1620-1643

O'barr, W. & Atkins, B. (1980) "Women's Language" or "Powerless
Language?", in S. McConnell-Ginet, R. Borker, & N. Furman (eds.),
__Women & Language in Literature and Society__, New York: Praeger.

Oehrle, R. 1983. An adequate rule for English tag questions. LSA Annual
Meeting, Minn.

Philips, S.U.:"The social organization of questions and answers in courtroom
discourse: A study of changes of plea in an Arizona court", in: Text 4
(Amsterdam 1984) 1-3; 225-248

Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson's (1978) "A simplest systematics for the
organization of turn taking for conversation" (in J. Schenkein's
_Studies in the organization of conversational interaction_).

Stubbs, Michael. "Judging the facts: an example of applied discourse analysis"
(_Anglistentag 1990_, T!bingen, Niemeyer, 1991) may be a good
starting point, although it is on the use of modals, and not exactly on
tags. There is also a very recent book called _the language of judges_
(or a similar title) which might be of interest to you.

Tannen's recent book _Gender and Discourse_.

Tiersma, P.M.:"The language of offer and acceptance: Speech acts and the
question of intent", in: California Law Review, 74 (Los Angeles, Cal.?
1986) 1; 189-232:

Ward, G. and B. Birner. 1992. The Semantics and Pragmatics of "and
everything". Journal of Pragmatics.

Woodbury, H.:"Strategic Questions in Court", in: Semiotica 48
(Amsterdam/Berlin 1984) 3/4; 197-228

Zanni, G.R./ J.T. Offermann:"Eyewitness Testimony: An Exploration of
Question Wording Upon Recall as a Function of Neuroticism", in:
Perceptual and Motor Skills, 46 (Missoula, MONT 1978); 163-166