Courses

In this course, we will examine accounts and images of historical legal events, ranging from “true” representations to openly fictionalized ones. The course is divided into four sections, each focusing on a set of related events or institutions in a particular historical moment: witch trials in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; colonial trials in the late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-centuries; the work of police detectives in the nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries; and mass media representations of trials, prisons, and policing in the late twentieth- and twenty-first-centuries. In addition to looking at archives of images, we will read pamphlet narratives, journalistic accounts, legal reports and opinions, biographies and autobiographies, and (in the latter portion of the course) we will watch film and video representations. Throughout the course, our principal focus will be on primary sources: their relationship to the history they represent; their rhetorical, narrative, and visual choices and meanings (both text and subtext). While introducing you to four different moments in the cultural history of law, the course will also introduce you to research methods in the interdisciplinary field of law and humanities, offering you opportunities to do original research in primary sources and to develop substantial research projects of your own. The work we will do together is interdisciplinary, drawing on interpretive methods from Literature, History, Art History, Anthropology, and more. But we will pay special attention to performance: the ways in which legal actors and subjects use law not merely instrumentally but also demonstratively, producing legal meaning by enacting it before spectators. There are no prerequisites, but the course is demanding, intended for students serious about diving into unfamiliar historical texts and engaging in challenging research.

Application instructions: To apply, please email Prof Peters <[email protected]> the following: school, year, and major; a brief description of why you are interested in taking the class; a brief description of the most substantial research projects you’ve undertaken previously (a few sentences describing each project); and a list of the 3-4 most relevant courses you’ve taken.