Law discourse and images

Abstract

This paper aims to offer some remarks upon the argumentative use of images - mainly photographs - in the legal proceedings of the criminal and labor areas. Notions and categories of dialogical discourse analysis, inspired in the works of Bakhtin and the Circle, are the theoretical-methodological basis of the paper. We understand that every utterance in law proceedings belongs to a genre defined in the ideological sphere of law and, as such, presents a thematic content, style, and compositional form appropriate to the genre. In addition, they constitute themselves as the unique discursive project of the enunciator, who occasionally combines words and images in the construction of persuasive sense. In the statements presented, the set of words and images expressed evaluative standpoints, whether in agreement or not. Moreover, the analysis showed some different voices of the countless speeches that circulate in our society.

Keywords

• Law discourse
• Dialogic discourse analysis
• Persuasion
• Verbal- visuality