Leaping Language and Cultural Barriers with Visual Legal Rhetoric

34 Pages Posted: 17 Sep 2014 Last revised: 20 May 2015

See all articles by Michael D. Murray

Michael D. Murray

University of Kentucky, J. David Rosenberg College of Law

Date Written: May 10, 2015

Abstract

This Article addresses communication within the "new normal" in legal education and law practice in which our audiences of LL.M. and J.D. students, clients, and jurors increasingly are diverse and multicultural. Communication with these audiences can be facilitated by using visual rhetorical techniques to apply a more universal language of communication through images, graphics, and diagrams to bridge gaps in communication caused by cultural and language barriers. This Article is the first to address the challenges presented by the growing population of non-native speakers of English with diverse cultural knowledge, history, and experience in law school and legal settings by looking to the growing body of scholarship on visual rhetoric, which draws from law and popular culture, cognitive studies and brain science, data visualization studies, and modern argument theory in rhetoric. The prevalence and ubiquitous growth of visual media in the world today, delivered across the globe through the pervasive vehicle of the internet, and combined with the technology to create, communicate, receive, and consume visual information, presents opportunities for legal educators and lawyers to use visual rhetorical devices to construct knowledge and understanding in their audiences, and ultimately, to persuade them of the truth and rightness of the communication. Therefore, this Article promotes improvement in the communication of law to language-challenged, culturally diverse audiences by use of the more universal language of visual rhetoric.

Keywords: visual rhetoric, communication, cognitive studies, brain science, rhetorical devices, graphic, language barrier

JEL Classification: K01

Suggested Citation

Murray, Michael D., Leaping Language and Cultural Barriers with Visual Legal Rhetoric (May 10, 2015). 49 U.S.F.L. Rev. 61 (2015) (Law Review Forum), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2496736 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2496736

Michael D. Murray (Contact Author)

University of Kentucky, J. David Rosenberg College of Law ( email )

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HOME PAGE: http://law.uky.edu/people/michael-murray

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