法律語言的模糊性——從語義學(xué)角度分析法律語言中的模糊現(xiàn)象.pdf

1、Law is omnipresent in our life. When we buy a car or a house, look for a job, take abus or train or plane, turn on the light, or even cross the street, we are engaging insomething that can cause a legal result. On all th

2、ese occasions our rights andobligations have been stipulated by law and will be stipulated by courts or even theSupreme People's Court in our country, if necessary.Law is embodied in lang[iage, that is, language is the c

3、arrier or expression of lawVagueness is one of the important characteristics of language so the quality of theproduct consumed by people in their daily life, namely,the law will definitely beinfluenced by vagueness in la

4、nguage.When we refer to a concept or an expression, we often think of its tangibleexamples. Take the word 'door' for example, the doors that immediately flash into ourmind are the movable boards turning on hinges in our

5、dorms or classrooms, or themovable frame of the cabinets. All these are typical instances of the expression of'door'. But apart from all these, what about the foldable and movable steel-madeframe at the gate of a college

6、 or the revolving glass-made stuff at the gate of a hotel?Can they be called 'door' too. At least we are safe to call them 'something like door' .because they lie in the area between the definitions of 'door' and 'non-do

7、or' and it isnot easy to specify whichcategory they should go to. So the expression of 'door' is avague one. The examples of vague expressions are conunon in ianguage. Legallanguage is no exception, because it has also i

8、nduced many so-called 'borderlinecases'. It has therefore brought some troubles to judges and lawyers in legal practice.But in the meantime, it is also vagueness that makes law accommodating andregulates varied social re

9、lationships and cases.This thesis is going to analyze vagueness in legal language from semantic andpragmatic perspectives. Chapter 1 gives a brief introduction to vagueness in language.Because theconcept of vagueness ori

10、ginated from the field of mathematics, I will alsointroduce a simple mathematical model to illustrate this concept. Chapter 2 is aboutlegal language. This chapter concentrateson the relationship between law andlanguage a

11、nd also briefs on the literature review in this field. Three embodiments ofvagueness in legal language are discussed in Chapter 3, namely, vag[Jeness caused bythe changing of meaning of words, by fringe meaning of words

12、and by tbe use ofemotive words. Chapter 4 analyzes the reasons of the existence of vagueness in legallanguage, namely, requirements of legislation, limitation in coniniunication and theneeds and expectations of the chang

13、ing society respectively The last chapter is asununary of the thesis and a discussion on the implications and the limitations of myresearch in this field.The pmpose of this thesis is to analyze law from a linguistic pers