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Administration of Justice and Multimodality in Media: Semiotic Translation, Conflict and Compatibility

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International Journal for the Semiotics of Law - Revue internationale de Sémiotique juridique Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Law as one sign system can be recorded and interpreted by another sign system—media. If each transaction in court is taken as a sign, it can be interpreted or transferred by different signs of media for the same purpose, though with different effects. This study focuses on the transformative effects of the semiotic revolution in media on law. The present research revealed that the evolution of media has driven the administration of justice to pay more attention to the process of court proceedings. This research also discusses the semiotic conflict and compatibility between the sign subsystems within media upon interpreting the administration of justice. In addition, disequilibrium between different sign systems highlights the consequent need for intersemiotic translation, consciousness and evaluation as part of decision making on court domains.

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Acknowledgments

I am grateful to two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions. The work described in this paper was substantially supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (Project No.: 1-ZV7D).

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Correspondence to Le Cheng.

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Cheng, L. Administration of Justice and Multimodality in Media: Semiotic Translation, Conflict and Compatibility. Int J Semiot Law 24, 491–502 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-010-9175-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-010-9175-8

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