Language and Discourse Dimensions
This research focuses on aspects in science theory and philosophy, which covers language in a broad sense. In this field, the interest is aimed at how the language theoretical applications can be expressed in concretised close readings of a legal field or a specific legal problem.
The researchers of the subject are cultivating the increasing interest for theoretical science application in substantive law research. The basis for the research is to combine so called legal dogmatics with theoretical tools in language and discourse theory. Themes such as story structures, communicative action, argumentation patterns and rhetorical activities concretise the legal problem solutions and their legitimation.
A fundamental idea is to thematise both effect factors and practical result of the constant changes in the law. By focusing on the linguistic and discursive contexts, the ambition is to give the research a new vital dimension, which involves both theoretical interest and practical relevance.
Current research
In a current research project the development of the legal argumentation forms are studied, where both discourse theoretical and narratological methods are used to read the legal legitimation structures in tort law. A new thesis on collective agreement law deals with how the labour law is created and upheld, studied from a narratologic legal dogmatic. It analyses both the role of change in society and the role of science in the legal discourse.
Another thesis on interpretation and gap filling deals with the dogmatic basic structures in the general contract law. In this thesis the classical distinction between interpretation and gap filling is subjected to a Kantian and Wittgenstein influenced “language critical” analysis. Several on-going doctoral projects have further connection to the research group’s language theoretical questions.
Contact
Researchers
Håkan Andersson, Professor
Sandra Friberg, Associate Professor and Senior Lecturer
Magnus Gulliksson, Doctoral Student