This article examines the courtroom as a workplace using Brown and Levinson's politeness model. It is argued that while the model is a valuable tool for analyzing courtroom discourse, the courtroom, as well as institutional and organizational contexts in general, possesses characteristics that demand a more complex contextual analysis. The article first looks at some ef the distinct characteristics ef language use in a courtroom setting, and then analyzes excerpts drawn from a courtroom transcript. Institutional factors that affect the model's petformance in this workplace are delineated. The article concludes that these institutional factors are not unique to the courtroom; they are relevant to understanding language use in many types ef workplace, including corporate, public, and organizational contexts. 1 CONSIDERING THE PURPOSES OF THE LEGAL SYSTEM-to use language efficiently and logically to arrive at the truth-one might propose that Grice's oft-cited Cooperative Principle and its supporting Maxims were a model for courtroom discourse: Speak the truth. Be relevant. Avoid ambiguity and obscurity. Say just what is required. Or, in the more eloquent version of the Cooperative Principle: "Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged" (Grice, 1975, p. 45). Grice proposed that the Cooperative Principle and the Maxims underlay all talk-exchanges and that all conversations were based on an implicit presumption of cooperation. Many legal evidentiary rules are, indeed, congruent with Grice's four Maxims, but, like Grice's Cooperative Principle, legal rules are often honoured more in their breach than in their observance. The court's rules were developed to achieve an environment which is rational and efficient,

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