Recent and upcoming day courses

If you would like to attend any of these events, please contact us.


: : February 2009
The Linguistic Courtroom

This one-day course will examine all aspects of courtroom interaction from a linguistic perspective. With students we will look at the nature of different question types in examination and cross-examination and the role barristers in building witness narratives through questioning. We will also examine witness responses from different types of witnesses, special measures used to protect vulnerable witnesses and possible techniques used by witnesses to avoid answering questions. Finally we will examine judge jury interactions and how judges instructions and summing up are understood by jurors. The course will be interactive examining real courtroom interactions and will provide students the opportunity to reflect on their own practice where this is relevant.


: : 12 December 2008
Forensic text analysis

This one day course will examine the techniques and findings of authorship analysis and introduce students to the potential and limitations of the approaches used. For more details, follow this link.


: : 16 June 2008
Working with an Interpreter

A natural consequence of the recent wave of immigration into Britain is a significant increase in the number of non-English-speaking witnesses and suspects interviewed by police forces throughout the country. Responding to this trend, the Centre for Forensic Linguistics at Aston University will hold a one-day workshop on 'Working with an interpreter', an event meant to sensitise police officers to the complex issues involved in public service interpreting and offer advice on how to manage interpreter-mediated interaction. On the one hand then, the workshop will aim at raising awareness of the role of public service interpreters and the nature of their work, thus enabling the participants to define their expectations for situations where non-English-speaking parties are involved. On the other hand, it will provide relevant practical training, making use of role-playing activities and real-life case studies. Please contact us for more details or to book a place.