Sponsor
Portland State University. Department of Applied Linguistics
First Advisor
Keith Walters
Date of Publication
9-22-2017
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (M.A.) in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
Department
Applied Linguistics
Language
English
Subjects
Police -- Language, Forensic linguistics, Speech acts (Linguistics), African Americans -- Violence against, Traffic violations
DOI
10.15760/etd.5775
Physical Description
1 online resource (iv, 70 pages)
Abstract
In recent years, the public has seen a rise in recorded footage of violent encounters between police and Black American citizens, partially due to technology such as cell phones, dash-cameras, and body-cameras. This linguistic study examines how these encounters get escalated to the point of violence by asking 1) what kind of directives were used, 2) how were they responded to, 3) how the directives contributed to escalation, and 4) how might power and authority have played a role. I use two case studies to analyze directives and their responses. Findings reveal that repetition of directives on the part of the officers, as well as the rejections to those directives on the part of the motorists tend to aggravate the conversation. I conclude that a variety of directives may represent a variety of reasons the officer might have for a motorist to comply with their directives and that police authority might be better understood and agreed to by the motorist if a variety of linguistic resources were used.
Rights
In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).
Persistent Identifier
http://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/21761
Recommended Citation
Haley, Jamalieh, "Escalating Language at Traffic Stops: Two Case Studies" (2017). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 3887.
https://doi.org/10.15760/etd.5775