Framing Anonymous Grievances as Letters of Complaint
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.32870/vel.vi5.41Keywords:
forensic linguistics, comparative analysis, anonymous letters, complaint letters, written discourseAbstract
This paper examined seven anonymous letters written to employees of a high-end grocery store in the Northeastern United States. Written and mailed over a span of five years, the initial letters complained about work issues while the latter ones escalated to include death threats. Under question was whether the letters were written by the same author. As no samples from any suspects were available, a framework for comparative analysis among the source documents was used. This study demonstrated how all seven letters shared similar features when analyzed as letters of complaint.
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