1,721,019 research outputs found
Parents, children and the porous boundaries of the sexual family in law and popular culture
No full textThis article focuses on a perceived ideological overlap between popular cultural and judicial treatments of sex and conjugality that contributes to a discursive construction of parenthood and parenting. The author perceives that in both legal and popular cultural texts, there is a sense in which notions of ‘natural’ childhood are discursively constituted as being put at risk by those who reproduce outside of dominant sexual norms, and that signs of normative sexuality (typically in the form of heterosexual coupling) may be treated as a sign of safety. These ideas are rooted in ancient associations between fertility, sexuality and femininity that can also be traced in the historical development of the English language. With the help of commentators such as Martha Fineman, the article situates parents and children within a discourse of family which prioritises conjugality, with consequences for the ways in which the internal and external boundaries of families are delineated
Bioethics as science-fiction: making sense of Habermas's 'The future of human nature'
No full textThere must be few philosophical projects more serious than Jürgen Habermas's lifelong effort to realize the lofty universalist ambitions of the Enlightenment in his communicative theory of rational discourse and deliberative democracy. © 2012 Copyright Cambridge University Press
‘Hell has no flames, only windows that won’t open’: justice as escape in law and literature
No full textStruggles for justice are commonly articulated in literature and drama through metaphors of physical encumbrance (of being cramped, constrained, entangled and mired) and escape (to open landscapes and a view of the horizon and sky). What is less well known or observed is that this metaphorical opposition of encumbrance/escape plays an important role in legal language too. This article traces the appearance of this metaphor across some key moments in English criminal law in which injustice is conceptualised metaphorically in terms of being held up, kept down or back, etc. and that achieving a just outcome necessitates shaking off the encumbrance and getting free. Through a close reading of some important legal judgments, it shows how establishing this intersection between law and literature helps to advance our understanding of the plausibility and persuasiveness of legal language. We apply this insight to producing a new reading of the Supreme Court’s recent reworking of dishonesty in Ivey v Genting Casinos [2017] SC 67, as well as a novel re-examination of established and apparently familiar authorities on recklessness and excuses to murder
Clamouring for legal protection: what the great books teach us about people fleeing from persecution: by Robert F. Barsky, Oxford, Hart Publishing, 2021, 271 pp., £75 (hardback), ISBN: 978-1-50994-315-9; The Walk, by Amir Nizar Zuabi (artistic director), David Lan and Tracey Seaward (producers), The Walk Productions, 2021.
No full textDonor-conception as a 'dangerous supplement' to the nuclear family: what can we learn from parents' stories?
No full textMetaphor and moral plausibility in legal judgment: constructing culpability on fragile foundations?
No full textThe struggle for justice is commonly articulated in literature and drama through metaphors of physical encumbrance (cramped, constraining conditions, being entangled and mired) and escape (e.g. to open landscapes and a view of the horizon and sky). What is less well known or observed is that a comparable metaphorical opposition of encumbrance/escape plays an important role in legal language too. This article traces the appearance of this metaphor across some key moments in English criminal law in which injustice is conceptualised metaphorically in terms of being held up, kept down or back, impeded, constrained or contained, and that achieving a just outcome necessitates shaking off the encumbrance and getting free. The article argues that analysis of this metaphor establishes an important intersection between literature and law. Following a discussion of the relevant general themes, the article offers a close reading of a number of appellate judgments on a range of criminal legal issues. Some of these judgments are very well known and concern questions such as how courts should set standards of culpability (e.g. on dishonesty and recklessness) and assess a defendant’s responsibility (e.g. the availability of ‘excusatory’ defences to murder). We seek to throw light on the way that the metaphors of encumbrance and escape work (or in some cases fail to work) in legal language, and thereby to advance understanding of the moral intelligibility, persuasiveness and longer-term prospects of judicial rulings as authorities
Victim-blame as a symptom of rape myth acceptance? Another look at how young people in England understand sexual consent
Full text linkThere is no doubt that being ‘critical’ about victim-blame requires ensuring first that it is the perpetrator and not the victim that is held responsible for sexual offending. At the same time, engagement with this topic requires critical acuity as to how victim-blame is identified, and to the boundary between raising legitimate questions about the presence or absence of consent in less than ideal circumstances, and a falling back onto myths and stereotypes that are unfair to complainants and damaging to victims. This paper identifies and critiques three purported intersections of rape myths and victim-blame that have gained widespread acknowledgement within feminist legal studies. Firstly, that a woman is blamed for voluntarily putting herself into circumstances in which ‘rape happens’; secondly, that a woman is blamed for ‘miscommunicating’ her refusal; thirdly, that consent is wrongly understood to have been given in circumstances where a woman in fact lacked the freedom to do so. This critique of methodological and analytical approaches to identifying victim-blame as a symptom of rape myth acceptance focuses on research published recently by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, ‘Sex without consent, I suppose that is rape’: how young people in England understand sexual consent
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