David Gurnham, Professor of Criminal Law and Interdisciplinary Legal Studies, School of Law, University of Southampton. When we think about what it is that legal scholars share in common, and whether there is any single concern that connects us all as part of a single endeavour, it is difficult to avoid concluding that marginalisation is [...]
By James Greenwood-Reeves, University of Sussex The public statue of Edward Colston, a slave trader during the 1600s, had been the subject of controversy for decades. Its uncritical commemoration of Colston, in the heart of modern, multicultural Bristol, struck many residents to be contrary to contemporary social values, and an ongoing insult to Black people within [...]
By Nishka Kapoor, National Academy of Legal Studies and Research, University Hyderabad A meeting of COP 26 was recently held in Glasgow, United Kingdom. The meeting focused on the ways to combat climate change and steps that must be taken to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. The other major issue raised at COP [...]
By Alvin Hoi-Chun Hung, Oxford Centre for Socio-Legal Studies Developing cultural sensitivity remains a challenging task for socio-legal scholars conducting research in a foreign culture. Most of us want to believe ourselves to be open-minded individuals. However, different people understand the world in such variant ways that it is sometimes hard to reconsider our deeply [...]
By Caroline Derry (The Open University), Yolanda Eraso (London Metropolitan University) and Matt Howard (University of Westminster) When lockdown began in March 2020, the rules about when people could and could not leave home, travel on public transport, and so on seemed relatively clear. The distinction between guidelines and criminal offences was less obvious and changed [...]
By Flora Renz and Clare Williams (University of Kent) The ways we do, talk, and think about socio-legal research have fundamentally shifted. State and University responses to Covid-19 have disrupted sites of power and privilege, of inclusion and exclusion, of access to resources and ability to be heard. Our approaches to research practices have shifted as [...]
The SLSA is pleased to be launching its first comprehensive membership survey on Monday 15th November 2021. The survey will improve our understanding of the profile of individuals who identity as socio-legal scholars, including lecturers, research students, and independent researchers. It will allow us to map the diversity of our community with reference to characteristics [...]
A Research Network based at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory Jen Hendry, Christian Boulanger and Naomi Creutzfeldt have teamed up to work on a book project to explore socio-legal connections as they develop. Although the focus for the project is the UK and Germany, we are interested to add more countries and contexts to the mix as [...]
By Russell Sandberg, Cardiff University Tradition is often just an excuse for not thinking. It is the means by which habits are perpetuated without questioning them and harden into unquestionable customs which future generations are then socialised into. This even happens in legal education. While the critical might of legal educators is applied to all [...]
By Gee Imaan Semmalar, Kent University After spending several months in India during the devastating “second wave” of the pandemic, I decided to travel back to the United Kingdom to continue research for my PhD. Academia is particularly unforgiving to postgraduate students who are on scholarships, doing teaching assistantships on a three-year funded PhD in this [...]