Martha Komter, Dilemmas in the courtroom: A study of trials of violent crime in the Netherlands. (Everyday communication: Case studies of behavior in context.) Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1998. Pp. xxix, 186. Hb $49.95, pb $27.50.

Abstract

Among the most relevant, practical issues in the courtroom – and explicitly recognized by attorneys well in advance of their occurrence – are the potential dilemmas involved in the questioning of witnesses. Practicing attorneys (and often their trial consultants) spend much time considering strategies for managing these. If we do X, this will happen; if we do Y, that will happen. Komter's book is a fine-grained and multiplex analysis of the interactional dilemmas that confront courtroom participants in cases of violent crime in the Netherlands. Using a conversation-analytic/ethnomethodological framework, she examines the communicative dilemmas that arise in a system with both adversarial and inquisitorial elements, and she shows how these dilemmas are shaped by the institutional interests of the participants. In a much broader sense, her study continues a strong empirical program initiated by Atkinson & Drew 1979 on the attribution and negotiation of blame in accusation sequences; but other readers may find Komter's work strikingly reminiscent of Pomerantz's classic analysis (1978) of the interactional dilemmas that shape compliment responses.