Ryan Malphurs

Rhetoric and Discourse in Supreme Court Oral Arguments

Sensemaking in Judicial Decisions

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

While legal scholars, psychologists, and political scientists commonly voice their skepticism over the influence oral arguments have on the Court's voting pattern, this book offers a contrarian position focused on close scrutiny of the justices' communication within oral arguments. Malphurs examines the rhetoric, discourse, and subsequent decision-making within the oral arguments for significant Supreme Court cases, visiting their potential power and danger and revealing the rich dynamic nature of the justices' interactions among themselves and the advocates. In addition to offering advancements in scholars' understanding of oral arguments, this study introduces Sensemaking as an alternative to rational decision-making in Supreme Court arguments, suggesting a new model of judicial decision-making to account for the communication within oral arguments that underscores a glaring irony surrounding the bulk of related research-the willingness of scholars to criticize oral arguments but their unwillingness to study this communication. With the growing accessibility of the Court's oral arguments and the inevitable introduction of television cameras in the courtroom, this book offers new theoretical and methodological perspectives at a time when scholars across the fields of communication, law, psychology, and political science will direct even greater attention and scrutiny toward the Supreme Court.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Routledge
• Seitenzahl: 248
• Erscheinungstermin: 19. Dezember 2012
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 235mm x 157mm x 18mm
• Gewicht: 517g
• ISBN-13: 9780415640046
• ISBN-10: 0415640040
• Artikelnr.: 36142119

Autorenporträt

Ryan Malphurs earned a PhD in Communication from Texas A&M University, USA, and is a Senior Litigation Consultant for Courtroom Sciences, Inc.

Inhaltsangabe

1. A Letter to the Chief Justice of the United States 2. Historical
Development of Legal Rhetoric and Supreme Court Oral Arguments 3. Do Oral
Arguments before the Supreme Court Matter? A Simple Explanation 4. New
Question: Oral Arguments "Matter," But How Do We Make Sense of Them? A
Modest Proposal 5. Critical Theories and Research Questions: Proposing a
Method to Capture the Madness of Oral Arguments 6. The Many Faces of Oral
Argument: Oral Argument's Purposes and the Justices' Styles 7. Arguing
about "Bong Hits 4 Jesus' Testing Theory and Method in Morse v. Frederick
8. Making Sense of Child Rapists in Kennedy v. Louisiana: A Firsthand
Observation 9. Historical Repercussions of Judicial Sensemaking: District
of Columbia v. Dick Anthony Heller 10. The Ground Covered and New Ground to
Uncover: Responding to Critics, Offering Recommendations, and a Final
Letter to the Chief Justice 11. Biased Sensemaking: Compromising the
Court's Rhetorical Authority