The analytical framework is made up of four levels. The first level is resolution of COI, the fundamental goal of court hearings. The second level is conceptualization, which consists of three components: conceptual content, information structure and speech management. The third level is context model schema, which includes participants, setting, discourse space and knowledge status. The fourth level is ways of construal, which can be analyzed into specificity, focusing, prominence and perspective. The downward arrows show further analysis based on the analytical tools at the levels of discourse, information and cognition. The upward arrows indicate that the result of the analysis at the three levels eventually float up to the first level to the legal problem.
As shown in Figure 3-3, the first level is the core dimension of solving the legal problem: COI and its resolution. It is the starting point of the analysis since the production of courtroom discourse and processing of information all center on participants’ efforts to solve disputes. It is also the terminal stage since this study aims to reveal the process of how COI is resolved based on the multi-dimensional analysis of courtroom discourse.
Court hearing can be analyzed into three basic stages (Xia & Shi, 2006; Du, 2009b): interest appeal, interest negotiation, and agreement reaching. Interest appeal is the most fundamental stage where litigants express their basic positions or attitudes in lawsuits (Du, 2009b).
Interest negotiation is mainly carried out under the guidance of judges, and mainly takes place at two axes: the horizontal axis and the vertical axis (Xia & Shi, 2006). The former refers to negotiation between opposing parties; and the latter refers to negotiation between the judge and litigants.
The third stage of court hearing is, on the basis of interest appeal and interest negotiation, to arrive at agreement between the two parties. According to Xia & Shi (2006), court hearing is a process, by adjusting the litigants’ inconsistency in their expectations of each other’s behaviors, to reformulate a relationship that is satisfactory to both sides. With the development of negotiation of interests, the divergence between the two opposing parties is being diminished and a certain kind of agreement is arrived at. As is proposed by Xia & Shi (2006), not only conciliation but also judgment is the result of agreement. With judgment, although an ultimate agreement fails to be reached as in conciliation, it has already included some compromise in fact-finding and consensus in the application of law, which differs greatly from the situation before litigation.
Figure 3‑4 Analytical Framework
The second level of the diagram has three components. Conceptual content is the general idea or basic position litigants adopt in the lawsuit. It is the primary result of cognition on the basis of which information structure and discourse are formulated and produced. Information structure is analyzed into information units, information knots, information elements, and tree information structure. How information flows is also examined in order to reveal the development of courtroom discourse. Speech management mainly concerns language strategies, which, apart from the cognitive management and information management, includes the discourse management strategies summarized by Tomlin et al (1997), namely, rhetorical management, thematic management and referential management.
The third level, context model, is the environment in which the three components of the second level are generated. Context model is analyzed into four components: participants, setting, discourse space and knowledge status. Participants is the most important category since context model, as a mental construct, is established by the collaborate effort of litigants and judges. Participants can be further analyzed into four subcategories: identities, social relations, participants’ behaviors and the related intentions/goals in the behaviors. Setting is mainly concerned with the physical and social environment of court hearings, with the former being analyzed into temporal and spatial settings and the latter, cultural, institutional and evidential settings. Knowledge status can be analyzed into information shared among participants and information source. Discourse space refers to the linguistic context of the communicative event, which is mainly concerned with how things that have already been talked about or will be talked about influence the ongoing discourse.
The fourth level is concerned with different ways of construal, which includes specificity, prominence, focusing and perspective. They are the fundamental abilities all cognitive activities are based on.
In this diagram, there is one factor that runs through all the levels discussed: interest, which is highlighted at the two sides of the diagram. It is based on interest that ways of construal is selected, context model constructed and conceptualization generated.
The three stages of court hearings, interest appeal, interest negotiation, and agreement reaching are examined to find out how they are realized on the three levels of discourse analysis. As was mentioned previously, resolution of COI at the top of the diagram is both the starting point and final goal of the study, which is like a satellite or spacecraft to be launched. The second and third levels are like a multistage rocket with “interest” at both sides as rocket boosters, which is used to send the satellite or spacecraft into space, metaphorically referring to the solution of the legal problem. The fourth level, the basic cognitive abilities, is the platform on which the “rocket” is launched.
