To ascertain the truth is the main goal of a criminal trial. In criminal trials, narration plays a very important role, for evidence chains are constructed when the prosecution side and the defense side represent the fact of the case and evidence usually by way of verbal narration. However, in this process, the prosecution party and the defense party may produce different versions of narrative or even confrontation due to their different purposes and positions. Based on the construal theory, this paper is intended to explore the narrative confrontation between the prosecution party and the defense party in the investigation discourse of the trial of Lao Rongzhi’s alleged intentional murder case from four aspects: scope and background, perspective, salience, and specificity. What’s more, with the assistance of KH Coder software, the co-occurrence of words between the prosecution party and the defense party in the narrative at the trial investigation stage is also analyzed in order to objectively visualize the differences in salience and specificity between the two parties in the narrative. It is found that there is evident confrontation between the prosecution party and the defense party and different images of the defendant are constructed in their narratives in court trial process. The prosecution party mainly activates the conceptual domain of “murder demon”, makes the intentional murder of Lao Rongzhi become salient from an objective construal perspective, and uses highly specific representation of details to describe the case process, constructing the image of Lao Rongzhi as a “murder demon”. The defense party mainly activates the conceptual domain of “victim”, highlights the inadequacy of the prosecution party’s evidence from a subjective construal perspective, and uses details of lesser specificity to obscure the course of the case, creating an image of Lao Rongzhi as a victim. The analysis of courtroom discourse from a cognitive perspective not only helps people understand the construction of courtroom narratives in a scientific way to give full play to the function of the courtroom, but also helps to promote the substantive process of China’s courtroom trial so that the claims of the prosecution party and the defense party can be fully displayed to contribute to the judge’s scientific and just judgment.

Wang Jie. A Study of Narrative Confrontation between the Prosecution Party and the Defense Party in Criminal Trial Discourse Based on Construal Theory. The Frontiers of Society, Science and Technology (2023) Vol. 5, Issue 16: 56-63. https://doi.org/10.25236/FSST.2023.051610.

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