PRESUPPOSITIONAL AND IMPLICATURE FEATURES OF LEGAL TERMS USED IN UZBEK AND ENGLISH MEDIA DISCOURSE

Abstract

The study of legal terminology within press discourse represents an important direction in contemporary pragmatics and discourse analysis. Legal terms used in newspapers function not only as carriers of legal information but also as pragmatic units that generate hidden meanings, background assumptions, and contextual inferences. This research aims to conduct a comparative analysis of presuppositional and implicature-related features of legal terms in Uzbek and English press discourse. Pragmatic, discourse-based, and comparative analytical methods were applied in the study. The findings demonstrate that Uzbek press discourse primarily relies on presupposition, activating readers’ background legal knowledge, whereas English legal journalism more actively employs implicature to convey evaluative and critical meanings. These differences reflect national journalistic traditions and the socio-communicative role of legal discourse in each linguistic environment.