"Words and language are the cause of much human conflict and are often the battleground on which such conflicts are fought. This is especially true of the civil law, where the usage and meaning of words form the crux of debates that are commonly resolved by precise analysis and interpretation. Civil cases are thus fertile ground on which to look at the role of language in law." "By looking at specific cases in the civil law, Roger W. Shuy shows how the skills of linguistic analysis can be used to resolve disputed meanings and how civil cases are important for linguistic scholarship. Shuy collects and analyzes cases involving contracts, advertisements, product liability, copyright infringement, discrimination, trademark disputes, and fraud controversies. In each case he employs the tools of formal linguistics to show how linguistics can be as helpful as the physical sciences in resolving legal disagreements." "This book will be of interest to linguists - sociolinguists, forensic linguists, and scholars and students of law and society - and to lawyers and law students."--book jacket.