Int J Semiot Law (2023) 36:1081–1107

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-023-10010-5

The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal

Language ‘Legal‘?

Ondřej Glogar1

Accepted: 19 April 2023 / Published online: 3 May 2023

© The Author(s) 2023

Abstract
Many legal theorists and linguists have addressed the notion of legal language from
different perspectives. Despite that, the definitions of legal language vary. Almost all
of the approaches conclude that legal language entails several types of communica-
tion. Nevertheless, not all of these categories are sufficiently researched. Some types
of legal communication seem to be neglected. This lack of interest might be rooted
in the uncertainty of whether these texts or utterances even fall under the scope of
the concept of legal language. In order to avoid this superficiality in subsequent
research, it is first necessary to come to a clear determination of which communica-
tive acts can be considered a part of legal language and which cannot. Accordingly,
in this search for the definition of legal language, we should not neglect the fact
that language is executed in concrete communicative acts, and the only means to
grasp the language is through communication. The aim of this article is therefore
to clearly delineate the boundaries of this concept. Based on analysis of how the
given term is currently defined, I draw out the common features and trace the char-
acteristics in which they differ. Taking into account these findings, I propose a novel
comprehensive demarcation of legal language. This concept argues that the ‘legal’
nature of language should be determined by the context and function of the particu-
lar statement or exchange, in connection with the role of participants in the commu-
nication. This means that a particular act may be considered a part of legal language
not in accordance with a certain form or lexicon used, but mainly by extralinguistic
circumstances in the context of which it is being performed.

Keywords Legal language · Communication · Conceptualization · Legal

communication · Pragmatics

* Ondřej Glogar
ondrej.glogar@mail.muni.cz
1
Department of Legal Theory, Faculty of Law, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic

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 1082 O. Glogar

1 Introduction

“Our law is a law of words. Words are also a lawyer’s most essential tools.” [1 p. 1]
These sentences can be found at the very beginning of Peter M. Tiersma’s extraor-
dinary book exploring legal language. There can be no doubt about their accuracy.
Recently, it has become clearer how apt these statements are, and how the study of
language is playing an increasingly important role in law and jurisprudence. Lan-
guage is not only essential for understanding the law and comprehending its content,
it is the very foundation for the existence of law [2]. Despite that, approaches to the
description of legal language vary [3, p. 273] and research often focuses only on a
selected segment of legal language.1 In order to determine what should be within the
scope of our examination, we need to find out first what are the borders and limits of
legal language, i.e. which speech acts should be the subject of our interest and taken
into account. We can also conclude that since there is no agreement on the defini-
tion of legal language, there is a risk of over-simplifying jurisprudence in relation
to the study of legal language. I also perceive it as problematic that jurisprudence
generally neglects the study of some types of communication, and, together, these
studies do not present a comprehensive picture of legal language. That is why I aim
to contribute to the discussion about legal language in this article, and explore more
deeply the concept that this term covers and represents.
The aim of this paper is therefore to find the criteria by which legal language can
be identified. At first glance this question may seem trivial, but as I will show below,
there are several possible answers and there is certainly no consensus on which defi-
nition is accurate. My effort will therefore be to define clear criteria that make a
language ‘legal’. In other words, how to recognise that a particular statement or text
is an example of legal language. I will not go down the route of listing all specific
examples or types or genres of legal language (in the sense of an extension of the
term), but I will look for general criteria that define what legal language is (i.e., the
intension of the term in Carnap’s sense [5]), since such a clear definition of legal
language is still lacking in existing state of the art.
This paper is divided into four parts. First, I will outline some notes on the topic
of conceptualization and describe in detail my procedure in searching for the con-
cept of the term ‘legal language’. Second, I present possible viewpoints on legal lan-
guage. This chapter serves as the core basis, as it not only summarizes the current
state of study but entails various approaches to defining the term and what should
be the characteristics of the phenomenon in question. The third part then presents
a critical discussion of these results. This should be a bridging chapter between the
concepts discussed and a proposed novel concept of legal language building on the
insights of communication studies and pragmatics. That naturally forms the main
content of the last, fourth, part. In conclusion I come up with a suggestion of what
should be the basic markers for determining whether certain text or speech should
be considered legal language.

1
Mainly focusing on the language of statutes, at most on the language of court decisions [see e.g., 4].

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1083

2 Looking for the Concept: Methods of Analysis

Before I proceed to the description of methodology and my chosen way of defining

the term ‘legal language’, I will briefly introduce the term ‘concept’ itself and how
it is used in this paper as it can often be the subject of confusion with other terms.
By concept I understand a mental construction that brings together observations and
experiences that have something in common, and which therefore summarizes a cer-
tain mental representation of a certain term [6]. Through concepts we can also map
the field of meaning in which we operate. We must distinguish the concept from its
designation (sometimes the word ‘term’ is also used in this meaning), since the con-
cept is in any case a certain intangible slice of reality to which the given designation
(term or word) refers. In some cases, a term can also refer to a specific thing. How-
ever, the term ‘legal language’ cannot be described by merely pointing to an object
(like e.g., an apple, a table etc.). Therefore, we need to find where are boundaries of
the slice of reality and reach certain criteria for defining it [7]. This is the concept I
will try to capture and define.2
The aim of this article is to come up with a concept of legal language. As with
almost any legal term (or maybe all the terms), its meaning is shaped, transformed,
and can be revealed through discursive practice, i.e., within the communication and
minds of individuals using such a term. In other words, the meaning of ‘legal lan-
guage’ is shaped by how it is used, talked about and thought about. Insights into
social reality might help to illuminate the boundaries and definitions of legal lan-
guage. For instance, Maciej Dybowski, when arguing for an inferentialist picture of
semantics, bases his conclusions on legal concepts being shaped through their use by
legal practitioners: “when legal practitioners use legal concepts (when they engage
in legal discursive practice (LDP)), they remain within given autonomous discur-
sive practice (ADP) in a natural language. It must be assumed that such practitioners
have discursive skills and abilities that extend in some respect beyond those of any
participant of ADP. Legislatures, administrative bodies, courts, solicitors, counsels,
prosecutors and so on are all institutional users in the sense that their discursive
moves in that practice count only insofar as they take place when such users act in
their official, status-related, capacity. It must also be assumed that practitioners are
reasonable in LDP, just as they are in ADP. LDP is built on the ability to use legal
concepts in order to form beliefs and/or actions that can be treated by other par-
ticipants of that LPD as having determinate content.” [9 p. 44] Based on Brandom,
Dybowski also concludes that the user of a concept is responsible for, and to, the
conceptual content. The user determines (in the sense of sharpening)3 the content

2
However, there is no complete agreement on how exactly to understand the word ‘concept’ itself, and
approaches to this term vary across the social sciences [8]. For the purposes of this paper we will use the
outlined definition.
3
This process could be more closely described as a certain refinement of the meaning of a given expres-
sion based on its use by speakers. For example, in which context the expression can still be used and in
which context the native speaker will not use it anymore and will choose another word. Or, alternatively,
a certain actualization of the meaning of the word, i.e. adding a new lexical meaning by using it in a new
sense and then, on the basis of each further use, the given meaning gradually becomes one of the layers
of the given expression. On the various layers of lexical meaning, see also [10].

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 1084 O. Glogar

of the legal concepts and provides some guidelines for future users. Moreover, the
users are themselves responsible to the concept inherited by prior users [9, p. 47].
Provided that legal concepts are shaped by the way legal practitioners use them,
and that legal language is a technical term [11, p. 93], we can look for the meaning
of the concept in legal discursive practice. I am aware that, by focusing on legal
practitioners, I could be (at first sight) undermine the original emphasis on taking
into account the complex social aspects shaping the content of the concept. How-
ever, the notion of legal language is specific. Although the layperson is likely to
be familiar with the term (perhaps as with many other legal terms), we can assume
that a more comprehensive idea of its extent will be held by members of the profes-
sional legal community. Indeed, one might expect laypeople to characterize legal
language more in terms of individual features (e.g., complex, incomprehensible), but
this does not illuminate the scope of the concept and delineate its boundaries. On the
contrary, these individuals will often have no idea which categories could even be
included in the extension of the term.4 Thus, only people with legal training or who
are otherwise deeply focused on law and language can shed light on this question.
It should also be mentioned that this work represents a rather analytical approach
to language. Although its discursive function has also been emphasised recently
(e.g. as an instrument of power according to Bourdieu [12] or language in the dis-
pute resolution process and its separation into official and deviant language as Sousa
Santos describes it [13]), it can be assumed that the concept of language as a means
of communication, still prominent and dominant, will be sufficient to define the con-
tent of the notion of ’legal language’. Therefore, I draw only on the classical view
of language (in the Saussurean and subsequent structuralist sense of language as a
system, as explained in detail below [14]). I am aware that this focus excludes from
my investigation a very broad (and perhaps recently dominant) view of linguistic
reality—be they critical legal theory, legal pluralism or postcolonialism. However,
most of these texts have in common that they are concerned with the problems asso-
ciated with the practical use of legal language rather than the nature of legal lan-
guage itself. Thus, while they are certainly significant and central to an understand-
ing of legal reality, they should be useful for the subsequent stage of legal language
research. Since in this paper I am seeking an answer to what legal language actu-
ally is (and not yet how it specifically operates and what it causes in society), these
streams will not be so helpful as they do not provide a comprehensive definition of
legal language (in the sense of intension of the term).
Given these considerations, one of the methods for the conceptualization of
the term at hand could be to approach a number of experts on the subject and—
put simply—ask them what they consider to be ‘legal language’ and how it should
be demarcated. The choice of such a technique would undoubtedly be innova-
tive and could provide some novel thoughts on the conceptualisation of this term.

4
Of course, this may be a certain prejudice, but in professional publications the opinion is held that
the “language of laws" is too complex and dense for ordinary citizens, which in a way evokes a certain
limited perception of the concept of legal language being the language of only one type of sources of law
[11].

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1085

Nevertheless, an analysis of the work of these experts, in which many of them have
already given their ideas on the content of the concept, could serve equally well.
Therefore, I will use the method of literature review inspired by some content analy-
sis technique. Of course, the topic of legal language is certainly not an unexplored
area, but the conceptualization of the term itself is a somewhat neglected topic. In
the case of a large number of samples, we would be unable to focus on specific char-
acteristics of the concepts and would have to be content with a more superficial anal-
ysis [15]. For these reasons, a qualitative analysis seems more suitable. The samples
chosen should reflect key perspectives on the formation of the concept (given the
significance of the influence of these individuals and their publications). A stratified
selection, ensuring that the research sample includes documents (or other data) in
key categories, seems to be appropriate for this (Patton describes this as ‘purposive
sampling’ [15]). While this method may suffer from a lack of transparency in the
sampling, it is, in my view, balanced by a considerable representativeness across
different theories and disciplines which could not be achieved by simply randomly
selecting publications. However, in order to make the process of selecting the works
under study clear, I have set out several criteria, which I describe below.
As part of the pilot analysis, I used the keyword ‘legal language’ as the default
search term. Within the search results, it was then possible to trace certain intercon-
nections when, for example, they cited similar authors or explicitly endorsed a par-
ticular methodology with which they approached legal language. I also came across
references to other works that were not part of the initial search results because they
worked with a different key concept (language of law, legal discourse, legal com-
munication) and I also took these works into consideration. In order to facilitate the
preparation of the search, I have grouped the studies into certain streams to make
them easier to work with. Up to now, I have identified mainly the legal-theoretical,
linguistic, semiotic, pragmatic and other applied and interdisciplinary approaches
(including, e.g., forensic linguistics, work with computer tools, translation and the
art of proper writing) [16]. From these streams I chose major publications that are
most relevant or have the biggest impact (by the number of citations). Furthermore,
more general publications that focus on legal language comprehensively were pre-
ferred over those that address only a particular aspect of legal language. This is
because these books or papers may provide a more accurate view of the definition of
the concept of legal language. Other criteria reflected an attempt to represent works
from different legal cultures and geographies, as well as both older and recent stud-
ies and the inclusion of more diverse disciplines besides legal theory.
On the basis of this key, I arrived at the following publications, from which I
extracted the particular concepts of legal language. First of all, we can look at the
legal language strictly from legal-theoretical approach. This workstream should
involve older studies, probably some of the first comprehensive descriptions of legal
language including legal theorists from both common law and continental system.
Let us take the following two works5:

5
From continental system we could also consider a work by Helmut Hatz [17]. However, Wróblewski’s
book was published earlier.

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 1086 O. Glogar

1. Wróblewski, Bronisław. 1948. Jezyk prawny i prawniczy.

2. Mellinkoff, David. 1963. The Language of the Law.

Legal language is an interdisciplinary term as it affects (at least) law and linguis-
tics. Hence, I would like to emphasise the need to not limit the research to legal
scholars and their view of legal language. We should be looking for the meaning of
this term at the intersection of both fields. An ideal proponent of this interconnec-
tion, being both legally and linguistically educated, is Peter M. Tiersma:

3. Tiersma, Peter M. 2000. Legal Language.

Since Tiersma is a proponent of common law thinking, to ensure more balance

I would like to compare his concept with continental linguistic approach. Such
descriptions can be found mainly in stylistics handbooks6 from which we can choose
a Czech one depicting the influential theory coming out of the so-called Prague Lin-
guistic Circle:

4. Čechová, Marie et al. 2008. Současná stylistika.

All the books selected so far represent more or less traditional ways of thinking
about legal language. The following works, however, should introduce a more recent
perspective view of the term in question. For this reason, only works of more recent
date, i.e. approximately no more than 10 years old, are included in the further analy-
sis. Such currently trending approaches are undoubtedly legal semiotics and legal
pragmatics. It is difficult to identify a single flagship covering the prevailing or main
ideas on the subject of legal language from these streams. Therefore, the selected
works are rather cross-sectional, chosen according to the criteria of novelty and col-
laboration of several authors (which should entail inclusion of multiple opinions):

5. Broekman, Jan M., and Larry Catà Backer. 2013. Lawyers Making Meaning.
6. Capone, Alessandro, and Francesca Poggi. 2016. Pragmatics and law: Philo-
sophical perspectives.

There are also streams that draw on other fields, e.g., using various computer
tools, practising translation of legal texts and speech, forensic linguistics, or many
handbooks on legal writing and legal rhetoric. However, many of them treat the mat-
ter rather selectively, and can thus only be used to provide a complementary per-
spective. On the other hand, a comprehensive overview can be found in the follow-
ing publications, focusing in the first case on the general theory of translation, and in
the second case on the analysis of the style of legal discourse.

6
Even though it might seem that a handbook does not have such relevance and scientific value, they are
picked because of their impact on the linguistic area of research as shaping the ideas of other linguists.

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1087

7. Cao, Deborah. 2007. Translating Law.

8. Garner, Bryan A. 2009. Garner on Language and Writing: Selected Essays and
Speeches of Bryan A. Garner.

To sum up, the works listed above were selected from diverse approaches to legal
language to be proportionally represented within the whole set. I am convinced that
this list encompasses not only different methodological and substantive approaches
to legal language, but also both classical and modern streams, plus diversity in the
background of fields and major legal systems.7 From each of these works, I will
extract a concept of legal language. A comprehensive description of these concepts
follows in the next chapter. Afterwards, I will proceed to analyse and compare them
in identification of common characteristics, and delineation of my concept of legal
language.

3 Approaches to Legal Language

Following the methodology described in the previous part of this paper, I will
describe possible viewpoints on legal language, and extract the key elements of the
concept of legal language they present. Firstly, let us look deeper into some (and
in my view the most important) legal theoretical works on this topic, which also
constitutes the most traditional branch of the research. Our second approach will
lead us, on the other hand, to the field of linguistics and how this area deals with
the phenomenon of legal language. Then, I will move on to more recent approaches,
all of which occupy a transition zone between jurisprudence and different branch
of study. In these interdisciplinary fields, we will be starting with legal semiotics—
the study of signs—according to which not only language but also law itself can be
understood as a system of signs. Then (in part 4) I explore the connections between
law and pragmatics, especially those aspects that liken law to (ordinary or natural
language based) communication. The last, fifth, part is devoted to other applied
approaches. It covers the fields of forensic linguistics, legal translation, legal writing
and rhetoric or corpus-based language analysis. This may appear to be a sort of a
residual category, nevertheless, outcomes of these approaches can have also much to
say about the concept of legal language.

7
Of course, one could argue that certain works or streams are missing in the review. Unfortunately, this
is an inevitable quirk of the social sciences, where each researcher comes from a different background
and different frames of reference are available to them (given, for example, by the language and geo-
graphical limitations of the author). However, the presented results were obtained based on the described
key and criteria (with regard to the chosen keywords, citation rate criterion, a preference for general
works that were entirely devoted to legal language), which at the same time should guarantee greater
transparency of the procedure.

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 1088 O. Glogar

3.1 Godfathers of Legal Language: Wróblewski and Mellinkof

Questions connected to language and its role in the fields of law are far from new.
Many legal scholars have tackled the issues during the history of jurisprudence from
various points of view.8 However, the first really comprehensive analysis of legal
language and its usage and characteristics is the work of Bronisław Wróblewski in
continental Europe (especially in Central and Eastern European circles) and David
Mellinkoff in common law countries. Even though the latter is probably more
famous and his book The Language of Law (1963) is now appreciated as ground-
breaking in this field, Wróblewski’s work is of more recent date. His book Jezyk
prawny i prawniczy was published in 1948 (posthumously), hence 15 years earlier
than Mellinkoff’s The Language of Law. However, probably because there is only
a Polish edition, it has not gained such an impact outside Poland and surrounding
countries. Both of these publications are not limited to legal theoretical implica-
tions but present a complex overview and description of the language of law. Based
on this, I consider both Wróblewski and Mellinkoff to be godfathers of legal lan-
guage—ergo the title of this subchapter.
As the title suggests, Bronisław Wróblewski bases his entire book on the distinc-
tion between ‘jezyk prawny’ (legal language) and ‘jezyk prawniczy’ (the language
of lawyers). This stratification of language used in legal realm was followed not only
by Wróblewski and other Polish scholars, but also by many others [see e.g., 19–21].
According to Wróblewski, legal language (stricto sensu) in this traditional categori-
zation represents the language of the sources of law or other manifestations of public
authorities. We could widen this description to not just the language of normative
texts, i.e., texts that are considered a formal source of law and that reflect a legal
rule (mainly, statutes or court decisions), but also generally to all acts issued by pub-
lic authority (administrative decisions, internal guidelines etc.). Some even question
whether the language used by academics within legal literature should be part of
‘jezyk prawny’ as well, regardless of its normativity or the lack of public authority
[19]. In contrast to these texts, there is the language of lawyers, which encompasses
expressions used by legal practitioners. This could include for instance the jargon of
attorneys or possibly communication by law students as well.
Nevertheless, even following this division, we face some challenges when we
try to comprehend what we mean by legal language. The key criterion of legal lan-
guage (stricto sensu) for Wróblewski is ‘officialness’ and an act attributable to state
authority. It is however a limited category, and even though the differentiation can
be helpful for academic purposes, it should not imply that only official legal com-
munication is relevant. On the contrary, language is a complex phenomenon which
should be researched in all its variations. Furthermore, the category of correctness
has recently become increasingly marginalised as the key ground for stratification of
language [22]. Besides that, language is continually developing through linguistic

8
Among others, for example, we can mention general issues of legal interpretation that work with lan-
guage in a fundamental way and involve several formal (linguistic) matters. As an example for all, H. L.
A. Hart and his discussion of the open texture of law and the vagueness of legal concepts [18].

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1089

practice, and can be subject to change and mutual transformation. For comparison,
similar classification of legal language can be found elsewhere. For instance, Ber-
nard Jackson differentiates written legal communication from oral [23]. Although
the divisions do not overlap entirely, they both emphasize that legal language cannot
be narrowed to written official texts in statutes or precedents [23]. The fact that legal
language can take many forms or varieties, is further discussed below.
Mellinkoff, on the other hand, uses a completely different definition of legal lan-
guage, or ‘language of law’ as he labels it (however, for the purposes of this paper,
I am going to use consistently the term legal language). He defines legal English as
“the customary language used by lawyers in those common law jurisdictions where
English is the official language.” [24 p. 3] Since he focuses on ‘legal English’, one
of the elements of the definition is also the geographical delimitation on countries
where English serves as the official language. Despite that, we can still highlight the
main part of his concept—the fact that he understands this phenomenon as the ‘lan-
guage used by lawyers’. Besides that he emphasizes the variety of legal language,
being determined by law as well as by the prevailing language of the particular envi-
ronment [24, p. 3–4].
Although The Language of Law is an extraordinary book describing the complex-
ity of legal language, Mellinkoff does not devote so much space to the delimitation
of the term. He instead takes the reader on a journey through history and the devel-
opment of legal English. Yet in the second part of the book, he depicts the language
of law based of the assumption (and apparently quite a fitting one) that it has many
flaws and is in general incomprehensible. For example, he characterizes legal lan-
guage with the following aspects—frequent use of common words with uncommon
meanings, use of old Latin and French words, terms of art, argot and formal words,
use of words and expressions with flexible meaning, attempts at extreme precision
[24, pp. 11–22]. Regardless of that, Mellinkoff also notes that these characteristics
may differ according to a given genre and thus implies an existence of various types
of communicative acts within legal language.

3.2 A Linguistic View: Legal Language as a Sublanguage or a Style

The linguistic field is perhaps not as concerned with law as legal theorists are inter-
ested in language. The reason for that is simple—it might seem that only a part
of language and communication is legal, whereas almost every aspect of law is
expressed in words.9 Legal-related issues present only one topic for linguistics, so it
is understandable that it is discussed on few pages of stylistics handbooks. Despite
that, they should not be ignored, because of their impact on the linguistic area of
research, together with other ideas from stylistics in general. Apart from these hand-
books, legal language attracts the eyes of linguists who are educated not only in lan-
guage, but also in law. One of them is Peter M. Tiersma. I included his work in this
approach since he follows Mellinkoff in a certain way—yet he also adds remarks

9
Or at least must be expressible in words, see [2].

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 1090 O. Glogar

from his linguistic expertise. Because of that I will start with his concept of legal
language and then I will move to its description in stylistics.
According to Tiersma, legal language is an extremely broad topic. Similarly to
Mellinkoff, he thinks of legal language as the language of lawyers. Although for
him it is not merely a tool for lawyers, it affects the daily lives of virtually everyone.
For instance, every time a consumer buys a parking ticket, he should read the small
print on the reverse side which is nothing if not legal language [1, pp. 1–2]. In his
book Tiersma gives an exhaustive description of all aspects of legal language. For
example, he concludes that the way lawyers speak and write (at least the English
ones) is different from ordinary language—it differs in lexicon or in the pronuncia-
tion of some words [1]. In addition, he is also trying to determine what exactly legal
language is in the sense of linguistic stratification. It is not dialect, nor jargon or
argot, since these concepts are associated with either a specific geographic or social
environment. The language of lawyers encompasses much more [1]. Not even the
notion of style is the best description, as the term itself is ambiguous (more attention
will be paid to this problem in the second part of this section on stylistics). It seems
that Tiersma leans towards the term sublanguage, by which he understands “lan-
guage used in a body of texts dealing with a circumscribed subject area in which the
authors of the documents share a common vocabulary and common habits of word
usage.” [1, pp. 142–143] According to him, many characteristics attributed to sub-
languages also apply to legal language. Legal language has a limited subject-matter
and its own special grammatical rules, as it differs from ordinary language not only
in lexicon but also in terms of morphology, syntax or semantics. That is why he
considers the language used by lawyers to be a subset of the language as a whole [1].
While Tiersma inclined towards the label ‘sublanguage’, some other scholars have
developed these ideas and proposed the notion of register as more convenient [25],
but we will get to that later in this article.
Tiersma also supports Mellinkoff’s conclusion that the language of lawyers
remains unclear and incomprehensible to the lay person. Similarly to Mellinkoff,
he lists some of the reasons that this persists. One of the reasons might be that this
way of communication is strategic and depends on the goal of the communication
(which is a concept widely developed by pragmatic approach as we shall see below).
Tiersma suggests that it can also be the adversarial nature of legal language or eco-
nomic reasons. He also mentions the notion that the language of law is ritualistic,
which provides speakers with a badge of membership in the community. And last
but not least, it can be motivated by the attempts of lawyers to be as objective as
possible, and to create the impression that law is mysterious and complex [1, pp.
241–244].
The most significant contribution of Tiersma’s work to the concept of legal lan-
guage is perhaps his emphasis on the fact that legal language is not a unitary system:
“There is great variation in legal language, depending on geographical location,
degree of formality, speaking versus writing, and related factors.” [1, p. 139] It thus
creates, as he calls it, various ‘genres’ of legal language [1, p. 51]. The genres have
different characteristics, and different stylistic rules, and expectations apply to them
as well. Besides written texts it can also include oral communication. This would
imply that legal language is an extremely broad area and we should be cautious

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1091

about generalizing conclusions and blanket descriptions of legal language when it

contains many genres that may differ. This idea can be also supported by the lin-
guistic axiom that language in general is not a simple and uniform phenomenon, but
a complex organism, differentiated vertically and horizontally, i.e., we can notice
social and functional as well as regional and territorial diversification of language
[26].
Let us now move to the strictly linguistic viewpoint of legal language with a
focus on Central European perceptions of stylistics. Linguists usually emphasize the
need to examine a particular communication act and its function (purpose), which
is followed by the speaker (addresser) in his utterance [26]. This idea was mainly
promoted by the members of the Prague Linguistic Circle (or so-called Prague
School) operating especially in the interwar period and which was spread and devel-
oped afterwards as part of the structuralist theory [27]. Style can be characterized
as a principle that leads us in the choosing of expressions and linguistics in par-
ticular speech. In this way it contributes to the construction of communication and
its meaning. Style has both a differentiating and a classifying role—it allows us to
distinguish a certain communication from another, and at the same time to classify
it in a superior group of texts and to treat it accordingly. The Prague School then
differentiates styles according to the leading function of the communication act, i.e.,
the intention pursued by the author, the purpose or the aim served by the speech [26,
p. 28].
It can be deduced that the stylistic handbook examined classifies legal lan-
guage as administrative style, within the normative and directive subtype [26, pp.
238–239]. The authors explicitly emphasize that merely ‘part of the legal agenda’
can be included in the administrative style but there is always an intersecting or tran-
sitional zone. Therefore, we need to consider the classification of each communica-
tion according to its predominant function. This remark can be useful and should be
noted. On the other hand, the handbook still mentions only judgments and statutes
or regulations. This somewhat selective perception of the legal field can be prob-
lematic if we agree with Tiersma’s conclusion that legal communication is much
broader. That is why it can be more helpful to consider the notion of the functional
style itself rather than clearly determining that legal language is a part of a certain
function style.

3.3 Law and Language as Systems of Signs

In the following subsection, I will move from purely legal or linguistic perspectives
on legal language to the approach of (legal) semiotics. The fundamental starting
point for semiotics (legal, as well as general) is the emphasis on sign systems and
communicative interactions [28]. Words as the daily-bread of lawyers are of a sign
character, i.e., they refer to something other than themselves, and by this they deter-
mine an effect upon a person (in Peirce’s words an interpretant) [29]. From semiot-
ics developed the view that law and language have much in common and can be both
considered sign systems, yet they also have a communicative form. As this seems
a crucial remark to conceptualization of legal language, I will firstly introduce the

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 1092 O. Glogar

dual nature of the word ‘language’. Afterwards I will describe some observations of
semioticians specifically on legal language.
Semiotics notes that language can be recognized in two forms, namely as a sign
system and also communication: “This fact underlines the system-character of lan-
guage (as made visible in traffic signs) and the communicative features of law (there
is no society without “signs of law”).” [30, p. 16] This follows the well-known con-
cept of Ferdinand de Saussure who differentiated ‘langue’ (language) and ‘parole’
(speaking). The former corresponds to an abstract system of signs and rules for their
usage which serve as prerequisites for the latter—concrete acts of speech executed
on the basis of selection and combination of units from the langue [14]. Legal semi-
otics adopts this dual nature of language and focuses on the signs per se and also
how they are used in communication, as production and uncovering of meanings.
For example, Roberta Kevelson, possibly a founder of legal semiotics, stresses that
law is envisaged as a language. On the one hand, it is a realm of arguments and
unique rhetoric, on the other it is a profession of words as signs that manage mean-
ing [30]. She claims that law can be considered a system of signs in terms of legal
semiotics, interrelated with other social sign systems such as language, provided
that law can be understood as a process of communication or exchange of meanings
(which are inherently sign-based) [28].
Nevertheless, these considerations are inevitably connected to one’s approach to
law in general, and the theory or concept that she adopted. Let us take for example
a classical dogmatic view of law as a system of rules (or norms) [18]. This view
could thus correspond to language in the sense of langue. On the other hand, the
view of law as a discursive space and social practice has been increasingly devel-
oped recently [31], followed by [32]. However, these seemingly incompatible views
can be easier to understand precisely by paralleling law to language (as langue and
parole). Law too can take the form of both an abstract system of norms (even lik-
ened by some to signs) [33, 34] and of communication. In my view these two forms
are interdependent and contingent, for there cannot be one without the other, and we
cannot examine law (as a langue-system) without examining individual communica-
tive acts concerning the law (in the sense of law as parole). Similarly see the extent
of the metaphor ‘law is language’ [16].
Similar accentuation of the importance of practice and discourse can be deduced
from the works of legal semiotics as well. This is most noticeable when claiming
that lawyers not only work with words and meanings, but also engineer them: “law-
yers manage meanings, because meanings are not beyond any human power of using
or inventing words, signs, symbols and special meanings. Consider how legal prac-
tice incorporates a specific body of knowledge, which at law’s core issue: making
law fit to multiple contexts of society.” [30, p. 109] In this view, law is determined
by the discourse, it is dominated by actions and through patterns of its practitioners
who eventually influence the shape of law. And legal practice (what lawyers do and
say) can be to some extent considered as law itself.
Mastering meanings entails engineering of a form of society as well, that is why
legal semiotics implies that legal language is an instrument of power. Lawyers move
between two different modes of communication, and by ‘translating’ one to another
they create meanings in incomprehensible ways which ensures them the status of an

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1093

elite [35]. To do this, they must “master two languages: the language of everyday
delivers them meanings of life in a directness that does not exist in law, and the
language of law delivers them meanings to operate in a jargon that does not exist in
daily life. The two, of course, intertwine but the legal- and state institutions wish to
have the citizen’s interests be translated in legal language so that the latter type of
language dominates their lives.” [30 p. 120] Roughly summarized, legal language
can be—according to the legal semioticians—described as language which must be
translated into regular language in order to be understood by lay people (and vice
versa).

3.4 Pragmatic Approach

The pragmatic approach can be in fact quite similar to what I described in the pre-
vious section as the semiotic concept of language. Compared to semiotics, legal
pragmatics focuses strictly on individual communication and uses different meth-
ods. In simple terms, it is founded on the assumption that every communication has,
in addition to its semantic content, a pragmatic content (level). No communication
takes place in a vacuum, but is influenced by extra-linguistic phenomena. In addi-
tion to semantics, the intention of the parties to the conversation and their mutual
expectations, context, barriers of communication, etc. play an important role in the
interpretation of a speech act [36].Furthermore, pragmatists focus not only on what
has been said but also on that which has been only implied. That might be the reason
why some authors tend to use the term legal discourse rather than legal language
(which can appear to be limited to the verbal side of communication). However, for
our purposes, I will keep on using the latter.
One of the goals of legal pragmatics is answering the question as to whether legal
interpretation differs from ordinary understanding [4]. Thus, they focus mainly on
the language of statutes and other normative text which must be interpreted. How-
ever, they principally acknowledge that legal discourse is much broader [see e.g., 4,
p. 42]. Izabela Skoczeń, for instance, divides legal language into the following cat-
egories (although she also notes that this is certainly not a definitive and exhaustive
list):

1. An exchange within a legislative body

2. An exchange between a legislature and courts
3. An exchange between a court and parties
4. An exchange between parties
5. Contracts and other legal declarations of intent [37, p. 2]

What can also be interesting are the numerous debates on the topic of whether
legal language is a part of common natural languages, or is a technical/artificial
language. Mario Jori arrived at a rather unusual perspective that legal language
is a mixture of both, i.e., partly similar to natural languages and partly similar to
an artificial one [38]. He also argues that the key feature distinguishing one type
of language from another is its function. Jori argues that the central point of legal

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 1094 O. Glogar

language is the usual connection to legal authorities, the associated coercive power,
and the interaction of laymen and jurists. Therefore, he proposes that legal language
is an administered language, as it ensures creation and changes of law and the com-
plex structural interactions between authorities, public and lawyers [38, pp. 58–59].
We can note the striking proximity of Jori’s concept of administered language (and
function as a determinant) to the Prague school of functional styles and the place-
ment of legal language on the borderline between administrative and professional
style. Both imply that the legal nature of language is characterized by a certain prag-
matic criterion, namely its function.

3.5 Legal Language Applied: on the Intersection of Fields

The applied approaches basically only support the broad view of legal language
described in regard to pragmatics of law. For example, although computer-based
research does not give a comprehensive description of legal language, we can
encounter the processing of many different types of communication in various cor-
pus-based and corpus-driven studies [see e.g., 39, 40]. Forensic linguistics takes
a similar approach to legal language when analysing discourse in legal settings in
various forms—oral and written, in statutes as well as in contracts, and not limited
to the speeches and texts produced by a lawyer (including issues connected with e.g.
voice identification, interpretation of expressed meaning in laws and legal writings,
statements, authorship identification or analysis of courtroom language used by trial
participants) [41].
But since the approaches mentioned above generally work with legal language
rather selectively (choosing a specific category without generalisation), it seems
more appropriate to start from a different applied field. We will first look at the the-
ory of translation of legal texts and the flagship text on the subject, Translating Law,
by Deborah Cao. The next section will focus on the work of Bryan A. Garner, one
of the most prominent proponents of legal writing and legal rhetoric. In particular,
I will draw on facts from these books that have not been covered, or at least not
strongly emphasized, in the approaches summarized so far.
Deborah Cao, similarly to Tiersma and many others, notices that legal language
is not homogeneous and does not just cover language of laws (statutes and other nor-
mative sources of law), but many other communications in legal settings. Therefore,
legal texts or communications may have various communicative purposes (norma-
tive or informative, prescriptive or descriptive). She also considers to what extent
legal language is based on ordinary language or if it is an independent, technical
language. While legal language has several peculiarities and deviations from ordi-
nary language (lexical, syntactical, textual or even pragmatic), it still shares a com-
mon core of general language [25]. Unlike Tiersma (and his conclusion that legal
language has the nature of sub-language), Cao describes legal language as a regis-
ter, i.e., “a variety of language appropriate to different occasions and situations of
use, and in this case, a variety of language appropriate to legal situations of use.”
[25, p. 9] As such, it is based on regular language, but in addition has some spe-
cial deviations (we could say, special signs and rules for their use). These deviations

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1095

are selected by the speaker from a register and applied according to the particular
‘legal’ situation at hand, and different signs and rules may be applicable in each
case. Thus, there might be different sub-types (genres) of legal language and each of
them comes with distinct characteristics.
Cao adopts a broad definition of legal language, as she considers it any “language
of and related to law and legal process. This includes language of the law, language
about law, and language used in other legal communicative situations.” [25 p. 9]
Though one may wonder whether the definition is really broad or rather vague or
even tautological. Nevertheless, she further clarifies this by assigning legal lan-
guage to language used in texts produced or used for legal purposes in legal settings
(even though she focuses in this list solely on texts, it can be applied to speeches
as well). She distinguishes four major categories of legal texts: legislative, judicial,
legal scholarly texts (academic literature or commentaries) and private legal texts.
It is interesting that the fourth category according to Cao includes “texts written by
lawyers, e.g. contracts and litigation documents, and also texts written by non-law-
yers, e.g. private agreements, witness statements and other documents produced by
non-lawyers and used in litigation and other legal situations.” [25, pp. 9–10] That is
different from the majority of above-mentioned approaches which usually consider
legal language only as texts produced strictly by lawyers.
Let us move on to Garner’s approach to legal language. He thinks about this phe-
nomenon especially from the view of style of writing, or as he calls it (referring to
Jonathan Swift’s definition) putting ‘proper words in proper places’ [42 p. 39]. And
that is why his work is grounded in a description of a tension between traditional
legal language and modern tendencies to use plain language. Garner can be certainly
considered a proponent of the plain language movement, as he repeatedly expresses
the belief that anything that can be simplified should be said in simpler words [42].
According to him, plain language is the “idiomatic and grammatical use of language
that most effectively presents ideas to the reader.” [42, p. 40].
In contrast to plain language there is the traditional one, so called ‘legalese’ as
“the complicated language of legal documents.” [42 p. 302] Garner counters the
idea that legalese ensures precision of legal texts, enjoys more respectability, or is
generally preferable. Although he strives for clarity, brevity and accuracy as well,
these qualities of a text cannot be guaranteed by legalese. And the belief that preci-
sion goes hand in hand with legalese is a myth [42 p. 296]. Garner also expresses
a view that these qualities—such as clarity, brevity and accuracy—are just the first
step. Everything hangs on context and purpose. Lawyers must do more than just
simply communicate, sometimes the aim is also to persuade or even delight [42].
Despite Garner’s favoring of plain language, we can presume that for Garner, both
legalese and plain language (in legal drafting) are legal language. Even (plain) lan-
guage used in drafting statutes or contracts (as it was in some attempts applied, see
[42 pp. 298–299]) still remains ‘legal’ and has the quality of language of law. Garner
actually argues that such language can have even bigger potential for the legal com-
munity to gain the respect of the public and maybe even the authority of law [42].
Let us take stock after this—I believe—intense and exhaustive chapter. So far, I
have described various concepts of legal language, and one might say that each of
them is different and with few exceptions they have little in common. I dare to say

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 1096 O. Glogar

the opposite. Although each approach emphasizes different features, they share a
common core. Alternatively, there appear to be at least germs of certain basic types
of legal language concepts that can be compared and critically analysed in their con-
text. Given the scope and complexity, I will address these issues in the following
chapter, which will also be an imaginary bridge to my definition of legal language in
the final section.

4 What Can Various Approaches to Legal Language Tell Us?

The following paragraphs are intended not only to summarize the concepts of legal
language described in the previous chapter, but also to abstract the key elements
from the concepts, compare them and discuss them. First, I will focus on the word
’language’. Then I will look into the attribute ‘legal’ and what connotations it may
have, which will lead us to a more detailed examination of the communication struc-
ture and its functions. At this stage, then, I will try to identify all possible criteria
that are considered to define the ’legal’ nature of language. However, it is already
evident here that there are several of these characteristics and that they overlap and
interfere with each other. It will therefore be necessary to critically evaluate them
and determine which criteria (or combination of some of them) will be defining for
the intension of the term under investigation.

4.1 ‘Language’: Communication, Sublanguage or Register?

As we learned from the semiotic approach, language can mean both the system of
signs (words), and the particular communicative situations of their usage. Com-
monly, we do not distinguish between these two meanings and often simply consider
particular texts as legal language. Of course, such a text is not itself legal language,
but merely represents one of the instances in which legal language is used. This dis-
tinction, however, is more of an academic question. Naturally, in legal communica-
tion (parole) we use nothing else than the legal language, and conversely, we come
to know legal language as a system of signs and rules (langue) only through the
individual instances of its use. They are therefore essentially two sides of the same
coin. Despite all this, it is good to remember that when we conceptualize the notion
of legal ’language’, we are looking for the definition of an abstract system of signs
and rules for their use. At the same time, we must focus on the texts and utterances
themselves, and it is only from their character that we can infer whether or not legal
language is used in them at all. Therefore, even though it could be more precise to
differentiate legal language from legal communication, the important thing is that in
order to paint the picture of the ‘system’ we must first grasp it through the particular
acts of communication.
What almost all of the concepts have in common is the emphasis on the heterog-
enous nature of legal language. Similar to language in general, legal language com-
prises many genres and varieties of oral and written communication, official as well
as unofficial (sometimes called jargon). However, it is sometimes pointed out that

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1097

written and spoken language cannot be considered the same and should be distin-
guished. Although texts and speech may have different characteristics, the emphasis
on the primacy or importance of only one is in many respects overcome (as Der-
rida in particular pointed out [43]). Particularly in the search for a concept of legal
language, this distinction is meaningless, since both forms of language are cases of
communication and fall equally under the use of legal language. That is why, in the
following, I always try to take into consideration both texts and speeches.
There is an almost unanimous opinion that legal language is rooted in ordinary
language, albeit with some variations—whether lexical, syntactic, phonetic or prag-
matic. From a linguistic point of view, there can be two notions to describe such
a phenomenon—either a sublanguage (as promoted by Tiersma), or a register (as
promoted by Cao). Sublanguage is usually understood as a subset of (sentences of)
a whole language in a particular community [44, 45]. But legal language should not
be just a part of a separate (linguistic) community of professionals. On the contrary,
there is a systematic interaction between jurists and lay people, and requirements
are placed on lawyers to ensure at least some degree of lay understanding [38].
Moreover, the lexicon and grammar (signs and rules of their usage) create only a
certain part of the lexicon and grammar of the language as a whole. On the other
hand, a register can be considered as a variety which supplies a taxonomy of features
according to certain situational parameters. They include determinants such as field,
tenor and mode, i.e., the type of activity (its content, ideas and institutional focus),
the status and role relationships of the participants and the channel of communica-
tion, respectively [46]. We can also note some similarities of the term ‘register’ and
the ‘functional style’ as termed by Prague School, since both of them refer to spe-
cific situational settings [45].
The concepts of legal language described above usually highlight the peculiari-
ties (on various linguistic levels) which cause the differentiation from natural lan-
guage. It can be deduced that the reason for choosing to use these peculiarities are
specific situational factors, mainly the nature of the actors and the purpose of the
communication (this will be discussed further below). Therefore, the term ‘register’
seems to correspond best and be appropriate as the description of legal language.
The most important thing is still what it entails. Legal language as a register should
include many kinds of features which should be chosen and applied in a specific
communication act based on given situational settings. We need to find out what
the situational settings should be that trigger the use of legal language. For now, it
is clear that defining them as ‘somehow connected to the law’ will not be sufficient.

4.2 What Could the Attribute ‘Legal’ Mean?

In the course of the previous chapter, the basic criteria for determining the ‘legal’
nature of legal language gradually crystallized. All of the approaches described pro-
vide interesting insights into legal language, and I am aware that they cannot be lim-
ited only to the way they define legal language. Nevertheless, for the purposes of

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 1098 O. Glogar

this paper, I believe I can draw from all of them the following possible criteria for
determining the ‘legal’ character:

1. Defined by a ‘quality’ (e.g., incomprehensibility, complexity);

2. Defined by ‘officialness’ (manifestations of public authorities bearing normativ-
ity);
3. Defined by speakers and their profession (as language used by lawyers);
4. Defined by an enumeration of genres or categories of texts or speeches;
5. Defined by situational settings (especially function).

Let us now look at each of these characteristics and assess how appropriate they
are or what is problematic about them.

4.2.1 Definition by a Quality

Criteria like ‘too complicated’ or ‘incomprehensible’ can be described as basically

the definition of a circle. They do not help to determine the extent (range) of the
term legal language, in fact they already describe what they consider as part of the
legal language. Furthermore, we can refer to Garner, who, although basically start-
ing from the definition of legal language as a poor style of writing, also considers
plain language as ‘legal’. Imagine, for example, a provision in a statute that is clearly
written in a concise and understandable sentence. Does it make it any less an exam-
ple of ‘legal language’ than a dubious complex sentences with several Latin words?
I believe not. A statute is a statute not by its length or a lexicon used, but by the form
of publication which enjoys the authority of being normative [45].

4.2.2 Definition by Officialness

Another characteristic is based on Wróblewski’s conception of legal language as

opposed to the language of lawyers. Without a doubt, this differentiation is useful as
it categorizes our perception and can help us to better understand and navigate such
a complex system. However, legal language cannot be limited to a language of stat-
utes and other normative sources of law. That would be too restrictive and would not
correlate with a complex legal discourse as we understand it from today’s, plural-
ist, perspective. Therefore, I support the idea of structuring legal language, but only
as an internal stratification, so that the concept is inclusive of all instances of legal
communication (which actually does not contradict Wróblewski’s view, who himself
paid a lot of attention to the language of lawyers) [47]. This is not to deny that the
language of legislation may have much greater relevance to jurisprudence, and that
different rules or characteristics may also apply. However, from this alone, in my
view, it cannot be concluded that the concept of legal language should be limited to
the language of statutes (such a conclusion is, in fact, contrary to most of the other
concepts described).

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1099

4.2.3 Definition by Speakers and Their Profession

Probably the most used criterion (proposed by Mellinkoff and followed by Tiersma)
is the nature of the speakers as legal practitioners. Two questions can be asked with
regard to this idea. Firstly, is legal language used solely by lawyers? Can there not
be any instances of legal language being used by a person without legal education
who is just somehow involved in the process of law? And secondly, should be every
sentence uttered by a lawyer be considered as legal language? Let us explore these
two issues.
Legal language is primarily inherent in the legal community. As Tiersma and
Garner show, it could be almost one of the privileges that symbolically confer on an
otherwise ‘ordinary’ person the status of someone enabled to practice law or at least
belonging to an exclusive group of people. Of course, this is more of a myth, but it
does not undermine the primacy of lawyers in the use of this specific language.
On the other hand, this view could raise the question of whether a statute is after
all an instance of legal language if we are not sure who wrote it or performed the
act.10 Not all lawmakers are lawyers. Or let us take for example an administrative
decision which can be issued by an official without legal education. And how about
a contract written by two parties that did not involve legal education? Or should we
consider as legal language any communication that has impact on a legal status of a
person (so even almost any implied-in-fact contracts as Mooney implies [49])? After
all, even a witness testimony is of importance for the process of law. Some of the
described concepts of legal language imply that these acts should be considered as
legal language. Moreover, there is no doubt about assigning this nature to statutes or
even (court) decisions as they are the typical examples of legal language.
Help to answer these questions can be provided, in my opinion, by the prototype
theory. This theory has played an important role in dealing with borderline cases
of meanings of terms [50]. Its central figure is Eleanor Rosch who conducted sev-
eral experiments on categorization, and promoted the idea that not all terms can be
defined by sets of features that are both necessary and sufficient (in classic Aristo-
telian way). According to Rosh, people have a prototype of a concept stored in their
memory, and then classify individual objects into categories based on comparison
with this mental image. If an object corresponds to a prototype, it can be classi-
fied under the concept that the prototype represents [51]. It may be surprising that
this theory has much in common with Hart’s thesis of the open texture of law [52].
Similarly to Hart, Rosh concluded that prototypical categories can be hard to clearly
define by using a single set of criteria, since they have blurred edges (in Wittgen-
stein’s sense of the term [53]). Therefore, we need to think about concepts as a cer-
tain degree of typicality for assigning a particular object to a given category (under
a given concept). There will always be some borderline cases that we have to assess
on a contextual basis, and often we will not even agree on their categorisation [50].
But we cannot, because of that, abandon the effort to grasp the concept and define

10
I am aware that this topic was discussed from many perspectives and that is why I am putting aside
that the notion of a communication by ‚lawmaker ‘ when enacting an act is not simply resolved [48].

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 1100 O. Glogar

it. At least some typical core of the concept is definable, so we can focus on it in
conceptualization.
Although the theory described uses largely experimental methods, it can at least
help us understand that some objects can be a more ‘typical’ example of a certain
term, and some can be only similar to it in some features. I would also say that legal
language can be a subject of imitation. A typical example is the generally wide-
spread practice of copy-paste contracts. Non-legal consumers often try to avoid the
expensive services of lawyers by downloading a template of a contract and adapting
the key parts of it. It is fair to say, I suppose, that such a document is not an example
of legal language, it is its mere imitation. Similar assumptions can be claimed about
some administrative decisions. These can be often prepared by somebody without
legal education, according to a template and the instructions of a lawyer. Or on the
other hand, a text of a statute or any other regulation is usually prepared by a legis-
lator (legally educated person) [11], even though it is often subject to amendments
or corrections in the subsequent legislative procedure. The difference is however in
the nature of such acts and the implications they entail. They are based on language
originally produced by lawyers. We should consider them as part of legal language
as a whole. regardless of the uncertainty of whether they were completely produced
by lawyers. Therefore, the acts of an official who represents a state authority can be
also instances of use of legal language.
Different attitudes should be, nevertheless, taken in regard to witness statements
and other lay talk. Even though they might be of enormous importance for the pro-
cess of law, they are not the purest form of legal language. On the other hand, we
can think of them as lay talk which must be transformed (or even translated) to legal
language by a judge or an attorney [54, p. 64]. Such transcripts of lawyers would
be an instance of legal language. However, the preceding form expressed by a lay
person is not.
We can move on to the second question outlined above, in particular whether
every text or speech written or pronounced by lawyer should be considered legal
language. Imagine for example a lawyer speaking to her lay husband or to her kids
about their plans for a dinner. I am sure that while lawyers can incorporate adopted
peculiarities from legal jargon into relatively ordinary conversations, such state-
ments will not amount to a prototypical example of legal language. Therefore, the
questions raised by the criterion of the nature of a speaker and some of the replies
above show that a ‘legal’ nature of language is not ensured just by the category of a
speaker. The concept of legal language should include more criteria than just ‘lan-
guage of lawyers’. This brings us to the fourth criterion, in particular the definition
by the enumeration of categories.

4.2.4 Definition by an Enumeration of Genres or Categories

Some concepts worked with listing of categories or genres covering instances within
which legal language is used. Although it could seem like a good strategy, these def-
initions usually do not deal with the specific function of a communication act itself,
but are focused more on the type of document or act (court decisions, contracts, wit-
ness testimony etc.). This procedure can lead to the omission of some genres. Also,

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1101

not every time can the ‘legal’ nature be determined by the type of a document, e.g.,
as stressed above, not all contracts will be of the typical nature of legal language
(for example, with regard to verbal consumer-to-consumer contracts alone). In this
article, I made it my goal to make the concept of legal language as comprehensive
and precise as possible. Evidently, the concept defined by a list of categories cannot
fulfil this aim.11

4.2.5 Definition by Situational Settings

The last characteristic entails the specific pragmatic role of the act of communica-
tion, or in other words, concrete situational settings. It is not a prevailing feature in
the concepts explored, however in a way many of them imply the use of something
more than just words and the form of a text or speech. This criterion emphasizes
the background, i.e., what is going on beyond the text or spoken words, and takes
into consideration extralinguistic features that can have an impact on the meaning
or are otherwise important for the communication. It needs to be pointed out that
this approach is based on the premise of performativity of law and the necessity of
communicating law and law-related issues [35, 54]. One of the most frequent factors
mentioned in the concepts described is the function (or purpose) of a communica-
tion. As it seems that understanding of communication in connection with its func-
tions is crucial for developing a concept of legal language, these topics deserve more
exploration and I will now briefly address them.

4.3 Functions of Legal Communication

Communication, especially in connection with its functions, has been extensively

elaborated by the Russian linguist (and at the same time one of the representatives of
the Prague structuralist school) Roman Jakobson. In his studies he observed both the
structure of communication and the creation of meaning in terms of its functions, on
the basis of which he also developed the well-known dual model of communication
[55]. In the first diagram, he presents the constitutive elements of a communica-
tive act. These are then followed in the second depiction by the individual functions
associated with the given elements. Jakobson builds on earlier procedural models
of communication by considering communication as a situation where the speaker

Fig. 1  Jakobson’s processual

model of communication

11
Cf. for example Kurzon’s approach, who also emphasized that legal discourse has not just a generic
side, but also a linguistic one (i.e., register that can be recognized by the function of a communication)
[45].

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 1102 O. Glogar

Fig. 2  Jakobson’s semiotic

model of communication

(addresser) sends a message to the addressee. However, since a message usually

does not refer to itself, a necessary complement to these three elements is context,
i.e., a section of the actual or possible world to which the message refers. To this,
however, Jakobson adds two more elements, contact and code. By contact Jakobson
means the physical channel and psychic connection between speaker and addressee.
In other words, it is the element of communication that constructs the relationship,
psyche or emotion between the transmitter and the receiver and enables them to ini-
tiate the communication and, with the help of maintaining contact between them, to
maintain the communication. The code can then be understood as a shared system
of meaning (essentially sign meaning) by which the message is structured [56]. The
process model of communication can be illustrated as follows (Fig. 1):
On the basis of the scheme above, Jakobson then created a corresponding repre-
sentation, through which he wanted to depict the basic six functions of language—
cognitive, emotive, conative, phatic, meta-linguistic and poetic. Each function is
determined by one of the six constitutive elements of communication mentioned
above. The first of these, cognitive function, concerns context and thus focuses on
the reality being referred to (the main purpose is to communicate information).
If the communicative act is directed at the transmitter and directly expresses the
speaker’s attitude towards what is communicated, Jakobson speaks of an emotive (or
expressive) function. In contrast, the orientation towards the addressee usually gives
rise to the so-called conative or appellative function, the clearest form of which is
the use of the imperative or vocative. A less common function is the phatic func-
tion (focusing on contact), which serves to establish and maintain communication.
In the case of a focus on code, we use the so-called meta-linguistic function, and, as
the last function, Jakobson mentions the poetic function, which is accentuated when
the message itself is at the core of the communicative act [56]. Jakobson mapped
these six functions onto a diagram corresponding to the procedural model and cor-
responding to the constitutive elements of communication (Fig. 2):
These functions can help us understand that communication is not merely about
transmitting information. It can serve various purposes, within legal realm notably
the conative function, as we can assume that some communication bears normativ-
ity and ensures that some individuals will (or shall) act in a certain way. Jakobson’s
model of communication highlights that communication is not only about a mes-
sage itself or about the participants of the conversation. More elements are involved.
Therefore, we need to examine all of these elements when proposing a concept of
legal language, and also the meanings of such communication reflected in the rel-
evant function of the act.

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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1103

5 The Concept of Legal Language

The concept of legal language can be described with a help of Aristotelian distinc-
tion between genus proximum and differentia specifica, i.e., by placing it in a gener-
ically superior concept (e.g., man is an animal) and assigning concrete specifica-
tions that distinguish it from other cases falling into the same category (e.g., social,
walking on two legs, talking, etc.). The word ‘language’ could serve as a sort of a
genus proximum since it indicates the form of the set of phenomena, a part of which
should be determined by the attribute ‘legal’. The meaning of the term ‘language’
must be however adjusted to more accurately reflect what it represents. That is to
say, it is not a natural, national language, but represents a certain register of it. That
means that as it is used in certain situations, but in addition/or as variable to regular
language, it has some signs and rules which are different.
The more pressing issue, however, is understanding how to recognize such use of
a register (special characters or rules). The previous section showed that it cannot
just be determined by the speaker, but also by the given context within which a cer-
tain act is performed (eventually by the addressee, message or code of the commu-
nication). As for the addresser, for a communication act to have the nature of legal
language it must be either performed by a lawyer (a legal practitioner) or it must be
attributed to a state authority, i.e., the act is performed by an authorized person who
acts as a representative of state authority. The second condition is dependent on the
context within which the act was performed and the function of the communication.
Let us now look more closely at these contextual and functional settings.
I have come to the conclusion that there are typically three situations of commu-
nicative acts linked to legal language. The first case involves the conative function
of the act implying that a norm should apply to a certain addressee. As such, the act
must be performed in a form or by a means of message that is, under given jurisdic-
tion, considered to be legally binding. In other words, this category would encom-
pass the acts that are generally accepted as a formal source of law. To the second and
the third one we cannot precisely assign a function in Jakobson’s division. However,
the context is important for both of these categories in the meaning of extra-lin-
guistic circumstances within which the communication is performed. One of them
would be a general reference to law (in the meaning of a set of norms). That is for
example a lawyer describing law or interpreting it for her client or discussing some
legal issue with her colleague. As another case we could imagine a communicative
act of a lawyer when she does not strictly refer to law but she is involved in the pro-
cess of law, in particular in the process of creation or application of law. There are
some uncertain cases in this type of context, for example individual norm-making
when a legal practitioner creates or concludes a contract or when she appears in
the courtroom just as a witness. For eliminating this grey zone, we should exclude
all those instances when such application of norms concerns a lawyer’s private life.
Thus, only those instances of acts in the process of law when a lawyer acts as a rep-
resentative of a legal status or in the course of her employment should be considered
as use of legal language.

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 1104 O. Glogar

And does an addressee or a code of communication matter in determining the

scope of legal language? I assume that the addressee can be almost anybody (if
there is any at all): state authority, another lawyer or a lay person. We could think
of the distinctiveness of a code of communication as well in a way that it somehow
bears normativity. However, that is not given by the code itself (sign system that
the addresser uses) but again by the context, since it has a form that is generally
accepted as a source of law.
To put it briefly (and perhaps a little tentatively), this concept of legal language
refers to the following types of communications. First should be the documents gen-
erally accepted as the formal sources of law, e.g., statutes, precedents, documents
reflecting some legal customs. Second case could be a lawyer when she refers to
law (in the course of performing her work/employment). This could be for instance
legal scholars’ literature, speech/opinion of an attorney to a client, conversation of
lawyers on a case (even with some specific jargon lexicon). And thirdly, some acts
in the process of law should be involved, such as communication within a legisla-
tive body, communication within court (written and oral), contracts and intents of
will. At this point, however, I want to remind you that this exemplary list is not a
delineation of the concept of legal language itself (indeed, I criticized this way of
formulating it above). Despite this criticism, even analysing these categories could
be enriching for the research of legal language. However in this paper I was looking
for an intension of the term (as opposed to its extension in Carnap’s terms following
Frege’s differentiation [5]).
I am certain that the concept of legal language outlined above can have some lim-
its. One of these can be the applicability of the conceptualization in all jurisdictions,
since our understanding of the term can differ across the world. To this I must make
clear that I focus mainly on the continental and common law view of law and this
concept is based on it. This also matches the chosen research methodology, which is
to reflect diverse approaches to legal language. The proposed concept is also quite
general and broad. That was however my aim from the very beginning. and it is
intended to serve as a basic starting point for more specific legal language research,
which should be based on established criteria and be aware of the scope of the con-
cept. It may also be worth clarifying that I am not of the opinion that all instances
of legal language are equally important. As many other legal terms, legal language
is an example of a term with blurred edges [53]. We can therefore only approxi-
mate the content of this concept, knowing that some cases will remain borderline
and debatable. Despite this, I am convinced of the importance of this exploration, as
it can help us to articulate these borderline cases and subject them to debate.

6 Conclusion

In this article I outlined the possible approaches to legal language and proposed a
novel concept of this term. Legal language is a part of language as a register which
uses suitable signs and rules of their usage in accordance with given communication
and its purpose. However, it can be problematic regarding not only the rules or signs
to use in a particular situation but also how we recognize that the situation triggers

13
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 The Concept of Legal Language: What Makes Legal Language… 1105

use of this register (of so-called ‘legal language’). The legal nature of language can-
not be characterized by formal features of a text or speech, nor is it sufficient to say
that it is the language used in state acts or by lawyers tout court. The best characteri-
zation is by a combination of the criteria of certain communication acts, notably by
its specific pragmatic (extralinguistic) role. The first key determinant is the nature of
the addresser who by a definition must be a lawyer. The second and equally impor-
tant determinant is the context within which the particular act is performed. Either
the context implies that the function of the communication is to create a legally
binding norm, or it refers to law, or it is performed in the process of creating or
applying law. Although legal language may not at first glance be a typical legal term,
it is undoubtedly a concept that is essential to jurisprudence and legal theory. In this
way, this article has the potential to help illuminate the meaning and scope of the
term so that future legal language research can build on this definition, knowing that
it encompasses many instances of communication of various kinds.
Acknowledgements This publication was written at Masaryk University as part of the project The Con-
cept of the Term Legal Language number MUNI/A/1529/2021 with the support of the Specific Univer-
sity Research Grant, as provided by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic
in 2022.

Funding Open access publishing supported by the National Technical Library in Prague.

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License,
which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as
you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Com-
mons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article
are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the
material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is
not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission
directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://​creat​iveco​mmons.​org/​licen​
ses/​by/4.​0/.

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