Analysis of a Staggered Discontinuous Galerkin Method for Linear Elasticity

We develop a staggered discontinuous Galerkin method for linear elasticity problems and prove its a priori error estimates. In our variational formulation the symmetry of the stress tensor is imposed weakly via Lagrange multipliers but the resulting numerical stress tensor is strongly symmetric. Optimal a priori error estimates are obtained and the error estimates are robust in nearly incompressible materials. Numerical experiments illustrating our theoretical analysis are included.