Transforming Legal Communication

This book examines creative new ways in which legal and administrative information is communicated to diverse audiences. Using a range of theoretical frameworks, it explores these transformations within broader societal issues such as legal activism, access to justice and citizen participation.Increasingly, there has been widespread recognition that non-specialists need to be able to understand legal information. Although plain language campaigns have made considerable progress in ensuring that legal texts are now less dense and more readable, such measures are often shown to be insufficient. For this reason, many institutions such as parliaments and courts have made considerable efforts to present this information in more attractive digital formats, and to disseminate the core messages via other media including video and virtual reality. In addition to addressing the social and political trends underlying these changes, the volume provides evidence of various cognitive and multimodal strategies used in different languages and cultures, investigating discourse practices in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and North America.The collection will be a valuable resource for academics, researchers and professionals working in the areas of law, public administration, communication and applied linguistics.