Sharma and Pareek on Colonial Constructs and Legal Myths: The Erasure of Hindi Jurisprudence and Dicta on Criminal Law Under the Shadow of English Legal Superiority

Prakash Sharma, Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law, and Animesh Pareek, IIT Kharagpur, have published Colonial Constructs and Legal Myths: The Erasure of Hindu Jurisprudence and Dicta on Criminal Law Under the Shadow of English Legal Superiority. Here is the abstract.

The British colonial enterprise in India restructured political and economic institutions and fundamentally altered the subcontinent's legal landscape. The systematic marginalisation and erasure of intangible Bhartiya heritage, especially in criminal law, was a crucial aspect of this transformation. This chapter examines the colonial imposition of the English legal system, viewing it not only as an administrative mechanism but also as a cultural and ideological initiative based on the belief in the inherent superiority and modernity of English law. The chapter examines the evolution of colonial legal discourse from the late 18th century, highlighting the portrayal of English criminal law as rational, secular, and progressive, in stark contrast to the depiction of Hindu law as irrational, archaic, and overly devoid of logic. The colonial state selectively codified elements of Hindu legal tradition that aligned with its administrative requirements, while disregarding extensive bodies of nuanced jurisprudence, especially those found in Dharmaśāstra literature and community-based justice practices. This chapter examines the suppression of Hindu criminal law as an aspect of broader epistemic violence, in which legal modernity is aligned with Western legal norms, thereby delegitimising non-Western legal systems. This chapter examines legislative developments and judicial opinions to elucidate the lasting effects of this erasure on postcolonial legal consciousness in India. Ultimately, the chapter contests the herrschendeErzählung(dominant narrative) that the English legal system represented a neutral or inevitable advancement over Bhartiya systems. This necessitates a critical reassessment of the influence of colonial legal constructs on current interpretations of law, justice, and legal modernity in India.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Johnson on Frederick Douglass: D.C. Recorder of Deeds

Randall K. Johnson, University of Missouri, Kansas City, School of Law, is publishing Frederick Douglass: D.C. Recorder of Deeds in volume 28 of The Green Bag (2026). Here is the abstract.

Frederick Douglass' surprise nomination, as the first Black D.C. Recorder of Deeds, represented yet another career milestone for the most photographed U.S. citizen of the nineteenth century. As head of the local agency responsible for registering property interests, Douglass played an important role in advancing local economic development, mostly by letting the world know who owns what real estate within the geographic boundaries of D.C. This point is underscored by the fact that Douglass earned the second highest salary in the U.S. federal government, which some have estimated to be as high as $40 per work day in 1886 dollars. My essay, further, builds upon this analysis by focusing on a third indicator of importance: the type, quality and quantity of local press coverage that Douglass received during his time as the D.C. Recorder (1881 to 1886).

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Seong-Hak Kim on Legal Pluralism That Wasn't: State and the Plurality of Law in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe

Marie Seong-Hak Kim, Käte Hamburger Kolleg "Einheit und Vielfalt im Recht", has published Legal Pluralism That Wasn't: State and the Plurality of Law in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe. Legaal Hre is the abstract,

Legal pluralism has seemingly become a new orthodoxy. Its core proposition is that law has no privileged relationship with the state. Students of legal history have reason for paying attention, as legal pluralism, a corollary of colonialism, has come to project back onto European history its cultural and social-scientific paradigm and arrogate to itself the role of explaining the evolution of normative orders in the continent's past. This article argues that applying to European history a theory premised on a contest between legal monism and pluralism brings more confusion than clarity. The difference between historically grounded legal pluralism and the contemporary theory of legal pluralism revolves around the question of whether multiple legal orders existed as part of state law or state law was merely one among many legal orders. In late medieval and early modern Europe, law was foremost equated with jurisdictional power, that is, authority to rule. Various kinds of laws, including custom, Roman law, church law, and legislation, operated in a plurality of practices within the state-centered hierarchy, and it was on this framework of state law pluralism that the European countries, while remaining under the doctrinal unity of the jus commune, each followed a discrete path of legal development shaped by political and institutional changes. The history of Europe provides little support for the theory that an imposed Romanitas or state sovereignty displaced and distorted good old customary law. Modern legal pluralist views may be in need of reconsideration not just in light of what was happening in late medieval and early modern Europe but also in terms of how Europe's ideas of legal order spread to the colonies in the late nineteenth century. Recent debates on legal pluralism serve as a reminder that history is distinct from an anemic version of the more theoretical social sciences. Still, the binary of unity and plurality in law can offer an unaccustomed yet useful direction in approaching the legal past.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Call For Applications, Witteveen Memorial Fellowship in Law and Humanities, Tilburg Law School

From Michel Bot, Associate Professor of Law and Humanities
Department of Public Law and Governance, Tilburg Law School
Program Director, Major Law in an International Context, University College Tilburg

Tilburg Law School (The Netherlands) is accepting applications for this spring’s one-month Witteveen memorial fellowship in Law and Humanities. Application deadline: September 21.

The Witteveen Memorial Fellowship in Law and Humanities aims to promote research and teaching on law and rhetoric, narrative, image, performance, sound, and/or culture.

The fellowship enables a junior scholar (PhD or postdoc level) to share and develop their research in the field of law and humanities during a residency at Tilburg Law School for one month in February-May 2026. There is a 5000 euro budget to cover travel and accommodation costs.

We expect the fellow to participate actively in the academic life of Tilburg Law School by presenting their research in a research seminar and by teaching a guest class to students. Past Fellows have also introduced film screenings, have organized a reading of their play with students, have read their poetry, have given a lecture performance, participated in a teach-out, in addition to participating in various research seminars.

Scholars who are in the final stages of their PhD research or who obtained their PhD in the field of law and humanities within the last five years are eligible.

Please apply via this link.

 

See past fellows via this link.

 

Call for Applications: Law/Justice/Ethics Positions, Haverford College

 

Call For Applications: Interdisciplinary Positions at Haverford College

Two tenure-track interdisciplinary law/justice/ethics jobs at Haverford College

Haverford College invites applications for two tenure-track Assistant Professors in its Peace, Justice, and Human Rights program, to begin Fall semester 2026. The positions are open to humanists and social scientists at all pre-tenure levels (including new PhDs through those who currently hold a tenure-track position) whose work is interdisciplinary and focuses on questions of justice, law, human rights, and related fields. Position 1 seeks scholars specializing in justice- or law-oriented work that engages with theory and can contribute to the vibrancy of an interdisciplinary program. Position 2 seeks scholars specializing in ethics-oriented work who are able to engage with the college’s new Kim Ethics Institute as well as contribute to the PJHR curriculum. Successful candidates for both positions will be required to teach an introductory course on peace, justice, and human rights and/or an applied ethics course emphasizing diplomacy over winning an argument, and also offer more specialized courses in their area of expertise. Scholars knowledgeable in both theory and practice in their fields will be best suited for these positions. Candidates should also be well-versed in inclusive pedagogy and prepared to mentor a diverse student body. Haverford College embraces the teacher-scholar model and supports faculty research through programs and funding opportunities such as a pre-tenure sabbatical after a successful 3rd year review. Candidates must have a PhD by August 31, 2026.  Peace, Justice, and Human Rights (PJHR) is an interdisciplinary concentration attracting students from many different disciplines; it offers students the opportunity to study the history, philosophy, and critiques of the rights tradition, examine issues of justice in their local and international contexts, and apply humanistic, social scientific, theoretical, and ethical reasoning to real-world problems. The program’s goal is to foster cross-disciplinary collaboration and new perspectives on entrenched problems. For more information, see http://www.haverford.edu/pjhr/  Still in the planning stages, the Kim Ethics Institute takes a holistic approach to ethical inquiry across the liberal arts, teaching students to address and evaluate competing goods and the consequences of choices in a global context. It brings scholarship, coursework, experiential learning, and collaborative action together, transforming theory into practice; and ethical inquiry into participation and leadership. For more information, see https://catalog.haverford.edu/programs/kim-ethics-institute/ Applicants should submit the following via Interfolio (https://apply.interfolio.com/171862): A cover letter indicating which position(s) are being applied for and addressing qualifications for the position(s), including a paragraph description of a course you’d like to teach in PJHR  A curriculum vitae A writing sample (up to 25 pages) or statement of research Applicants should arrange for three confidential letters of recommendation to be submitted directly by the recommenders via Interfolio. All application materials must be received by the end of the day on October 24, 2025 in order to receive consideration. Haverford College is a leading liberal arts college serving highly motivated students on a nationally recognized arboretum in suburban Haverford, just outside Philadelphia. For more information about Haverford and this position, please see here: https://www.haverford.edu/provost/available-positions/tenure-track-search-peace-justice-and-human-rights-pjhr-additional-information  Questions about the application process should be directed to hc-pjhrsearch@haverford.edu. For technical questions, please contact Interfolio directly at 1-877-997-8807 or help@interfolio.com.  Haverford College is an Equal Opportunity employer committed to diversity, equity, inclusion, social justice, and providing equal opportunities and access to all individuals regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin or ancestry, age, marital status, disability, or veteran status. Women, non-binary and transgender individuals, people of color, Indigenous people, and those with other or multiple historically marginalized and/or underrepresented identities are especially encouraged to apply. Haverford College and our consortial partners are located on Lenape lands.

Serafin on The Corruption of Blood as Metaphor

Nicholas Serafin, Santa Clara University School of Law, has published The Corruption of Blood as Metaphor. Here is the abstract.

Article III, Section 3 of the United States Constitution states that “Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood.” Corruption of blood was a common law punishment according to which individuals adjudged guilty of treason were deemed to possess “corrupt” blood and thus were stripped of the right to transmit property to any heirs. Conversely, their descendants lost the ability to inherit property or titles through the corrupted ancestral line. The punishment was typically imposed via attainders, that is, parliamentary determinations of an individual’s guilt without recourse to a trial. Legal authorities and legal scholars have offered a number of interpretations of the Clause. According to one interpretation, the Clause simply bans the corruption of blood, as this punishment was understood in common law. According to another interpretation, the Clause prohibits the punishment of children for the sins of their parents. According to yet another, the Clause stands for the principle that individuals should not be singled out on the basis of stigmatized group characteristics. Legal scholars remain divided over how to interpret the Clause. Part of the problem lies in the fact that while a number of legal scholars have examined the history of attainder, few have investigated the origins and meaning of the corruption of blood. In fact, much of the history of the punishment, including significant legal precedents discussing the corruption of blood, has not made its way into existing legal scholarship. This Article breaks new ground by tracing the origins of the Corruption of Blood Clause to the Roman law of infamy. I demonstrate that the punishment was imposed not simply for treason but rather for conduct or physical characteristics that were thought to be morally shameful. As the punishment was adopted in feudal Europe, the idea of corrupt blood became associated with individuals and groups who possessed stigmatized physical characteristics. In American law, this sense of corrupt blood was retained and applied particularly in cases involving immigration, integration, and intermarriage. In these cases, non-white groups were deemed to possess corrupt blood and so were excluded from the American body politic. Drawing on this history, I defend a “group-status” interpretation of the corruption of blood. I argue that the principle prohibits state action that singles out outcast groups, particularly groups defined by stigmatized physical characteristics. Because stigmatized physical characteristics are often shared by group members and passed down through generations, the principle is especially relevant when children are threatened with intergenerational punishment. The corruption of blood principle thus provides a separate foundation for important antidiscrimination doctrinal tools, such as the Court’s animus and stigma jurisprudence. Yet I also argue that the Clause itself bears directly upon issues like felon disenfranchisement and the Trump administration’s child-separation policy at the United States- Mexico border.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Molina Bustos on Cultural Analysis of the Legend of the Alligator Man

Francisco Fabiany Molina Bustos, EDUKIVOTOS, has published Cultural Analysis of the Legend of the Alligator Man. Here is the abstract.

This academic work explores the multifaceted dimensions of the Colombian legend El Hombre Caimán, analyzing its social, ethical, emotional, territorial, and economic functions. Through interdisciplinary lenses—myth theory, semiotics, pedagogy, cultural transmission, and symbolic economy—the study examines how the legend adapts across generations, media formats, and cultural contexts. It highlights the role of the myth in community identity, emotional processing, moral teaching, and cultural tourism, while critically reflecting on the risks of commodification.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Molina Bustos on Cultural Analysis of the Legend of the Whistler

Francisco Fabiany Molina Bustos, EDUKIVOTOS, has published Cultural Analysis of the Legend of the Whistler. Here is the abstract.

This academic project explores the Colombian legend of El Silbón through multidisciplinary lenses, examining its role as a myth in shaping ethics, emotions, social norms, identity, and economic potential. Analyzed from theories by Durkheim, Aristotle, Plutchik, Moscovici, and Harvey, El Silbón is shown to function as a pedagogical, symbolic, and cultural resource. The study reveals its adaptability to modern media, its emotional and psychological depth, and its use in tourism, ritual, and intergenerational transmission. It argues that the legend is not only a vessel of fear but also of identity, memory, and community resilience.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Rocheton: Among the Voices of the French Revolution: Olympe de Gouges' Political and Legal Pamphlets

Julie Rocheton, Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, has published Among the Voices of the French Revolution: Olympe de Gouges’ Political and Legal Pamphlets as the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory Research Paper Series No. 2025-11. Here is the abstract.

This article explores the often overlooked political and legal pamphlets of Olympe de Gouges, a French revolutionary thinker whose contributions extend far beyond her renowned Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen. In her prolific writings between 1788 and 1793, de Gouges crafted a nuanced blueprint for social justice aimed at protecting vulnerable populations, advocated for women’s rights, and proposed progressive reforms in family and criminal law. Her work consistently foregrounded themes of equality, civic responsibility, and the moral obligation of the state to support its citizens, particularly those marginalized by poverty, gender, and social hierarchy. Throughout her writings, de Gouges was both ahead of her time and constrained by it. Her proposals embodied an Enlightenment-inspired belief in “natural law,” which she used to validate her ideas in the face of societal limitations on women’s intellectual contributions. While she championed equality, her moral framework sometimes restricted the inclusivity of her proposals, particularly in her critique of women. As a political thinker, her stance towards the monarchy was complex, sometimes even paradoxical. She initially advocated for a constitutional monarchy but adjusted her views as the revolution progressed, mirroring the complexities of the French population’s loyalties and the radical shifts of the revolutionary era. This study brings de Gouges’ political and social philosophies to light, assessing their historical impact and looking at her pamphlets as a coherent body of work in order to underscore her lasting legacy as a pioneering thinker.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Concepcion on The First American Law Libraries

Cattleya M. Concepcion, Georgetown University Law Library, has published The First American Law Libraries at The Green Bag Almanac and Reader 80 (2025). Here is the abstract.

A brief history and bibliography of the first American law libraries, including lawyers’ personal law libraries, bar association or membership law libraries, county law libraries, state law libraries, court law libraries, federal law libraries, law school libraries, law firm libraries, and prison law libraries.

Download the article from SSRN at the link. Note: This work is (or will be) published by the Green Bag (www.greenbag.org), which hopes you will find it useful.

Upcoming Conference: Melville's Legacy For Law and the Humanities, University of Cincinnati Law School, October 24-25, 2025

Upcoming Conference at the University of Cincinnati Law School, October 24-25, 2025

Melville's Legacy for Law and the Humanities

Co-sponsored by the University of Cincinnati Law School and the Law and Humanities Institute

See the website link below for a list of speakers and more information about registration. Speakers will include Brook Thomas, Richard Weisberg, Paul Finkelman, Marguerite Allen, Jenny Doctor, Sanford Levinson, and Robin West. 

 

https://www.lawandhumanitiesinstitute.org/events/melvilles-legacy-for-law-and-the-humanities-2

Paradise on Agape and Law in Byzantium

Brandon L. Paradise, Rutgers Law School, Newardk, has published Agape and Law in Byzantium. Here is the abstract.

This study focuses on agape love and Eastern Orthodox soteriology as master narratives in the Byzantine legal imagination. It is an approach to the conference theme that inspired this chapter--the "sacred arts of Orthodoxy" in so far as the "art of legal disputation," so central to Byzantine literature, is a much neglected area of study, where rhetoric, ethics, legal theory and theology all coincide in a symphonia which is distinctively "Orthodox." As scholars have recently argued, law in Byzantium is better understood as a rhetorical, literary negotiation of broad, extra-legal religious, cultural and philosophical narratives than as an autonomous, formalist-positivist discipline that mirrors the scientific aspirations of modern western legal systems.560 Rather than attempting to generate formally correct "legal" solutions derived exclusively from rule or formalist discourse, Byzantine law seeks to render 'substantive justice' as measured by extra-legal narratives, including—and perhaps most importantly for this study—the master narratives of the gospel and Orthodox theology.561 Concretely put, this means that law in Byzantium is more an exercise in literary negotiation and applied morality than an exercise in technocratic and autonomous rule reasoning. Thus, unlike modern western legal systems, Byzantine law clearly imagines itself less as legal science and more as artistic practice. The praxis of this artistic endeavor is the shepherding of society on the basis of agape-love and in the direction of Orthodox soteriology, so that law becomes a force for realizing these two extra-legal cultural ideals.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Muñoz on The American Revolutions of 1776

Vincent Phillip Muñoz, University of Notre Dame, Department of Political Science, has published The American Revolutions of 1776. Here is the abstract.

Through the Declaration of Independence, the founders set in motion three interrelated revolutions: They put forth a new understanding of the foundations of political authority, crafted a new conception of government's purpose, and recognized the existence of religious truth and the legitimacy of religious authority. In this way, America's founding was animated by both the spirit of liberty and the spirit of religion.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Bilder on Hater of Kings: Catharine Macaulay's Constitutional Regicide and the Declaration of Independence

Mary Sarah Bilder, Boston College Law School, has published Hater of Kings: Catharine Macaulay’s Constitutional Regicide and the Declaration of Independence as Boston College Law School Legal Studies Research Paper No. 654.

The American Revolution was a constitutional regicide. At first glance it does not much resemble a regicide. Charles I had been executed in 1649. George III went on to live nearly half a century beyond 1776. But read the Declaration of Independence carefully and notice how large the king looms. The “present King of Great Britain” aimed to establish “an absolute Tyranny.” The eighteen usurpations each began with He, the king. The king embodied two particular political typologies: Prince and Tyrant. As such, he was “unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” This constitutional justification for regicide had been developed by British historian Catharine Macaulay in the fourth volume of her History of England. Macaulay’s history from James I to the execution of Charles I provided a historical model, theoretical explanation, and blueprint for would-be patriots. Because of Macaulay, on the far side of the Atlantic, American revolutionaries renounced their allegiance to the king–and to any king–without the complications and consequences of executing one.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

McKoski on David Davis, Abraham Lincoln's Favorite Judge

Ray McKoski, University of Illinois, Chicago, School of Law, has published David Davis, Abraham Lincoln's Favorite Judge (University of Illinois Press, 2025) Book sections - Introduction and Biographical Sketch of David Davis. Here is the abstract.

David Davis, Abraham Lincoln’s Favorite Judge explores two aspects of Judge David Davis’s interesting and important life. First, the book traces Davis’s unmatched contribution to the political rise of Abraham Lincoln. Davis’s unbreakable loyalty to Lincoln forged while they traveled the central Illinois court circuit, their shared Whig origins, Davis’s voluminous political and personal contacts, his organizational skills, and as Lincoln put it, Davis’s knack “of making a man do a thing whether he wants to or not,” all combined to make the judge Lincoln’s strongest and most effective political supporter. In evaluating Davis’s role in Lincoln’s assent to the presidency, the book engages in a long overdue examination of the professional and personal relationship between the two friends. Second, the book details Davis’s vital contribution to the fabric of the legal system—impartiality on the bench. Off the bench Davis left no stone unturned in advancing the political career of Lincoln and made no secret of his personally held “fixed opinions” on subjects such as Democrats, temperance, and abolitionists. In court, however, Judge Davis set aside his beliefs and relationships and rendered decisions free from personal, political, and social views; friendships; public pressure; and partisan loyalties. Even Davis’s sharpest critics on the political front acknowledged his judicial impartiality and honesty. And Davis’s independence was on full display after Lincoln appointed Davis to the U.S. Supreme Court. To the disdain of Republicans, in Ex parte Milligan Davis disallowed the use of military commissions created by President Lincoln to try civilians in non-seceding states in which the courts were open. Then in Railroad Company v. Catharine Brown, Davis rejected the argument that “separate but equal” passenger cars complied with the railroad’s congressional charter. Davis found that segregated cars were prohibited as a “badge of slavery.” Twenty-three years later in Plessey v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court would ignore Davis’s reasoning and uphold the separate but equal doctrine.

The extracts are not available from SSRN.

Muñoz on History and Tradition in the Trump Justices' Church-State Jurisprudence

Vincent Phillip Muñoz, University of Notre Dame, Department of Political Science, has published History and Tradition in the Trump Justices’ Church-State Jurisprudence. Here is the abstract.

This article analyzes conservative Supreme Court justices' recent use of history and tradition in First Amendment religious liberty cases. It argues that these justices have failed to articulate a persuasive rationale as to why exactly the Establishment Clause must be interpreted by reference to historical practices and understandings and that they have failed to adequately show that history supports their "no-coercion" construction of what constitutes a prohibited establishment. Concerning the Free Exercise Clause, the court's conservatives have dismissed history by disregarding historical practices that do not conform to their approach to the text. The court's use, misuse, and nonuse of history cannot help but give the impression that policy preferences-more than history or the actual original understanding of the First Amendment-have determined recent church-state decisions.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Hrdy and Brean on Testing the Gernsback Hypothesis: Science Fiction's Influence on Patents and Innovation

Camilla Alexandra Hrdy, Rutgers Law School; Yale University Information Society Project, and Daniel Harris Brean, Senior In-House Intellectual Property Counsel, Respiratory Care, Philips; Intellectual Property Expert in Residence, Duquesne University Kline School of Law, are publishing Testing the Gernsback Hypothesis: Science Fiction's Influence on Patents and Innovation in the 2025 Symposium Issue of the Houston Law Review. Here is the abstract.

A common thesis in the science fiction community is that science fiction has an impact on innovation because it inspires readers and even professional scientists to perfect and put into practice the inventions they learn about through science fiction. We call this the "Gernsback hypothesis," because it was posited most clearly by the science fiction editor and inventor, Hugo Gernsback. This paper reveals that patents provide an invaluable source of information for testing the Gernsback hypothesis. It explains several approaches for using patents to test whether, and how, science fiction influences inventors. It reveals the strengths and weaknesses of these approaches. This paper should be of particular interest today, when powerful tech moguls admit that science fiction deeply influenced their pursuits, from artificial intelligence, to virtual reality, to space travel. It would be helpful to gain a more precise lens into how science fiction affects inventors. Patents could provide a resource for gaining insights into this process.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Murray on Liberalism, the Founding, and American Criminal Justice

Brian Murray, Seton Hall Law School, is publishing Liberalism, the Founding, and American Criminal Justice in volume 101 of the Notre Dame Law Review (2025-2026). Here is the abstract.

In the past decade, two groups have taken aim at the American political and legal experiment: critics of modern liberalism and contemporary criminal justice reformers. Liberal critics point to the corrosive effect of liberal ideas on governmental, legal, social, and private institutions. Criminal justice critics lament systemic racism and classism, power imbalances, over-criminalization, and mass incarceration. Broadly, both groups argue the American political and legal experiment was destined to fail, and has failed, given its ideological roots. This Article puts both into conversation and makes two arguments. First, it explores whether criticism of the liberal paradigm offers another explanatory horizon for the ills of American criminal justice. Second, it suggests there is strong evidence that these trends were not the original design of the Founders, who, while operating within the liberal tradition, sought to entrench certain pre-modern ideas into American criminal justice. Four developments in the modern American criminal legal system—relating to lawmaking, procedure, adjudication, and punishment—provide evidence of the critique of the excesses of modern liberalism. First, the system has become almost entirely positivist, leaving officials to exclusively determine the boundaries of criminal law and definitions of punishment. Over-criminalization and confusion about what punishment is has resulted. In the procedural realm, core doctrines are nominalist and utilitarian in how they attempt to protect privacy and liberty. Third, the liberal, social contractarian ethic that permits equating voluntary agreement with justice, however artificial or divorced from the truth, persists in plea-bargaining norms and practices, separating the legitimacy of criminal adjudication from reality. Finally, modern liberal premises manifest in a sentencing system primarily concerned with controlling risk—through quantified instrumentalization. While these trends align with the pathologies of modern liberalism identified by critics, Founding thinking directly contradicts these developments. The Founders were not legislative positivists, either generally or with respect to criminal law and punishment. Second, criminal procedure protections were tethered to the world of things, not sentiments about interests. Third, juries were tasked with adjudicating criminal matters, determining truth, and injecting their normative views into the legal system. Finally, the moral underpinnings of criminal law animated Founding thought on sentencing and punishment. Thus, while modern liberal premises and excesses help to explain some systemic developments lamented by criminal justice scholars, these trends contradict aspects of the original design, meaning they are paradigmatic rather than originally intended.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Werner on The Physics of Law

Swen Werner, My Digital Truth, has published The Physics Of Law. Here is the abstract.

This paper interrogates the structural preconditions of lawful decision-making by showing that law is a symbolic system grounded in logical coherence, semantic stability, and operational consistency. It argues that contemporary legal interpretation increasingly abandons these foundational requirements, leading to a form of institutional dysfunction where law devolves into a belief system. Drawing from Roman legal architecture, computational logic, and legal theory, the paper reframes rights not as normative entitlements but as structurally necessary constraints within a rule-based system. It proposes a non-normative justification for private property as a logical gate enabling coherent legal action among actors with equal rights and no default duties. Through critical analysis of machine adjudication, AI unreliability, and copyright enforcement, it illustrates how legal coherence is undermined when the symbolic form of law is severed from its functional logic. The paper concludes by presenting a framework to restore lawful governance through epistemic clarity and constraint-based reasoning, arguing that legal systems must enforce coherence or collapse into ritualized control. Law is not opinion - it is computation.

Download the paper from SSRN at the link.

Dojcinovic on War Crimes: Definition, History, Practice

Predrag Dojcinovic, University of Connecticut, Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute; International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (1998-2017), has published War Crimes: Definition, History, Practice. Here is the abstract.

This encyclopedic entry on war crimes provides insights into their definition, historical development, and application in major international criminal trials. As some of the gravest offenses under international law, war crimes involve serious violations of international humanitarian law committed during armed conflict. Defined in Article 8 of the 1998 Rome Statute, they include targeting civilians, torture, and using child soldiers. Rooted in ancient norms and shaped by Grotius, the Lieber Code, and the Hague Conventions, the concept evolved significantly through the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1977 Additional Protocols (APs), which extended protections to civilians and non-international conflicts. Enforcement by tribunals like Nuremberg, ICTY, ICTR, and the ICC has established clear jurisprudence, affirming individual criminal responsibility and refining the legal elements of war crimes.

Download the entry from SSRN at the link.

Khan on Civil Rights Lawyering and the Reconstruction of Law and Literature

Almas Khan, Civil Rights Lawyering and the Reconstruction of Law and Literature, at 29 European Journal of English Studies 1 (2025). Here is the abstract.

Interrogating the place of race in law and literature has newfound urgency in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision striking race-based affirmative action in university admissions and a renewal of the “canon wars” in U.S. politics and academia. Amidst this turbulence, legal scholars have published landmark articles unmasking the racist intellectual history of several doctrinal fields. Their critiques inform this essay, which charts a counter-genealogy of law and literature’s growth as a field grounded not mainly in academic work but civil rights praxis. The essay first summarises the traditional narrative of law and literature’s emergence as an interdiscipline, close reading canonical texts that craft a genealogy of elite white men building the field. Next, the essay presents a narrative of the field centralising the work of civil rights lawyers from Reconstruction to the civil rights era. Turning to this alternative archive highlights Black lawyers’ role in constructing the field, including through theorising about interdisciplinarity and re-forming literary genres to promote racial justice. The essay ultimately encourages law and literature scholars to consider how an exclusionary intellectual history of the field has shaped their research and how a more inclusive intellectual history can revitalise the interdiscipline.

Here is a link to the abstract and the notes. 

Sanders on Reasonable Doubt About James Bradley Thayer

Anthony B. Sanders, Institute for Justice, is publishing Reasonable Doubt About James Bradley Thayer in volume 18 of the Elon Law Review. Here is the abstract.

This Article responds to some recent pathbreaking work concerning the real-world justification for James Bradley Thayer’s famous 1893 essay The Origin and Scope of the American Doctrine of Constitutional Law. Thayer’s essay defended the use of a “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard when judges engage in judicial review and additionally claimed the standard was of longstanding and widespread acceptance. The recent scholarship has argued Thayer was justified in this historical claim. I respond by arguing that although the standard was mentioned and praised in a variety of sources, in line with Thayer’s claim, when seen in the context of a wider body of caselaw it becomes quite suspect. I survey how state high courts applied—or, more importantly, did not apply—the reasonable doubt standard during a sample of years shortly before Thayer’s essay: 1880 through 1884. I find these courts only mentioned the standard in a small minority of cases when they exercised judicial review. When courts relied on the standard they did so haphazardly and as a practical matter it did little work to affect the outcome of cases. Indeed, these courts seemed to have simply avoided the standard whenever they wanted to. It was exceedingly rare for majority opinions to invoke it when declaring a law unconstitutional, even though the same majorities ruled laws were constitutionally invalid in more than a quarter of the cases in which they exercised judicial review. Before Thayer the standard was, for the most part, exactly what he claimed it was not: rhetoric. But although Thayer was wrong about the past, he shaped the future. Thayer’s version of the reasonable doubt standard, directly or indirectly, later became the modern rational-basis test. That is a standard that influences the outcome of cases. But it is not the same thing. Thus, a tradition of “reasonable doubt” in actual holdings was of limited reality before Thayer. But he is at least partly responsible for the later very robust—but different—reality.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Crivelli on Eighteenth-Century English Marriage and Inheritance Law in Pride and Prejudice

Chiara Crivelli (no affiliation provided) has published Eighteenth - Century English Marriage and Inheritance Law in Pride and Prejudice. Here is the abstract.

This paper examines how Pride and Prejudice reflects the intersection of marriage, inheritance, and gender in late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth-century England, with a focus on the legal implications for women. The central research question is: “How does Pride and Prejudice engage with contemporary marriage and inheritance laws to reflect the economic and legal dependencies of women in this period?” Using a socio-legal historical approach, the paper explores the legal doctrines of coverture and entailment, tracing their historical development from the De Donis Conditionalibus clause in the Statute of Westminster (1285) to their application in Austen’s time. The analysis draws on legal scholarship, particularly J.H. Baker’s work on English property law, to examine how Austen’s treatment of inheritance laws—particularly entailments—shapes the financial prospects and autonomy of women in the novel. The paper is structured as follows: the first chapter provides a biographical and thematic overview of Austen’s work. The second chapter situates Pride and Prejudice within the social and legal context of Austen's England, focusing on class structure and gender norms. The third chapter explores the legal implications of marriage, particularly the doctrines of coverture and their impact on women’s legal identity. The fourth chapter focuses on inheritance law, specifically entailments, and their role in restricting women’s financial autonomy. Ultimately, this paper argues that Pride and Prejudice critiques the restrictive legal and social systems of its time, illustrating how marriage served as both a means of survival and a legal constraint for women.

Download the paper from SSRN at the link.

Blocher and Siegel on The Ambitions of History and Tradition in and Beyond the Second Amendment

Joseph Blocher, Duke University School of Law, and Reva Siegel, Yale University School of Law, are publishing The Ambitions of History and Tradition In and Beyond the Second Amendment in volume 174 of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. Here is the abstract.

This Article examines the ambitions of history-and-tradition review in and beyond the Second Amendment. In Bruen and Rahimi the Roberts Court rejected means-end review in favor of a historical-analogical approach, claiming to constrain the exercise of judicial discretion, and thus to promote the democratic decisions of the founders. But our examination of these cases shows that the Court has created new opportunities for judges to advance their values in considerably less transparent ways. We identify contexts in which Second Amendment doctrine enables judicial discretion, key among them that it allows judges to reason about gun rights and regulation at disparate levels of generality, extending rights protection to modern guns while requiring gun laws to resemble ancient analogues. When applied in this asymmetric fashion, the historical approach deregulates in ways that are neither acknowledged nor justified. An eight-member majority objected to this strategy in Rahimi and voted to uphold a federal gun law. Yet numerous Justices wrote separately to limit Rahimi’s reach—and, a year later, to suggest that the Court should take a case involving an assault-weapons ban to clarify the method set forth in its earlier cases. Our close reading of the history-and-tradition (HAT) cases shows that there is a persistent gap between what the Court says and does—between the judicial constraint the Roberts Court promises and the actual decisions it delivers. Understanding this dynamic in the Second Amendment cases helps us recognize it in the First Amendment and Substantive Due Process cases as well. We can better appreciate the Court’s reasoning in extending HAT review if we excavate the arguments advanced in the decade between Heller and Bruen for substituting the HAT approach for means-ends review. This retrospective shows us that HAT approaches exhibit the very problems imputed to means-ends review: HAT review is not grounded in original understanding and employs shifts in generality to provide judges discretion to enforce value-based understandings. We can see this dynamic unfolding inside and outside the Second Amendment context. HAT decisions pose distinctive threats to democracy. First, Bruen has implemented HAT through judicial review with a strong presumption of unconstitutionality, a counter-majoritarian practice lacking precedent at the founding. Second, HAT review is not transparent, obscuring reasons for judicial decisions from the people and thus obstructing democratic dialogue. Third, the HAT framework encourages judges to decide the constitutionality of public safety laws on grounds that ignore the public’s most urgent reasons for enacting the laws. This reading of the Court’s Second Amendment cases indicates that the push to adopt HAT approaches in First Amendment, Due Process, and other areas of constitutional law is likely to compound the problems it is supposed to solve, while insulating the Court’s control of the Constitution from the public governed by it.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Gurnham on Stopping the Boats, Changing the Narrative: How the Migrant Refugee Bildungsroman Became a Ghost Story

David Gurnham, Stopping the Boats, Changing the Narrative: How the Migrant Refugee Bildungsroman Became a Ghost Story, 37 Law & Literature 29-52 (2025). Here is the abstract.

What literary conventions best help us understand the migrant refugee’s claim for protection, and the terms on which law claims to offer it? One contender to have attracted attention recently is “bildungsroman” (“formation novel”), since the narrative of the refugee escaping danger and oppression to find safety and stability within a host state arguably maps onto bilgungsroman’s themes of a protagonist’s difficult personal journey from margins to social acceptance and flourishing. However, this view is now seriously undermined by legislative initiatives in the UK aimed at ensuring migrant refugees who cross the English Channel in small boats should have no cause to hope for such a happy ending. By way of a close reading of the narrative implications of these initiatives, this article proposes a thorough rethink of our approach to figuring the irregular migrant refugee. Rejecting bildungsroman as now implausibly optimistic, the article suggests we look instead to the ghost, whose “presence” is typically the chief problem for those to whom it appears, whose “shape” is uncertain, and whose complaints and demands inspire dread and strenuous efforts to make it disappear. The article employs these conventions to draw a new relationship between refugee migration law and the arts, and argues that if the UK’s policies for “stopping the boats” may be characterized as an attempt to effect such a disappearance, then the migrant refugee’s reappearance in visual art offers a ghostly figuration of resistance and of admonishment at injustice unredressed and obligations unfulfilled. The article traces these qualities and explores their critical potential through two recent works of visual art, namely “The Walk” (2021–22) and Gideon Mendel’s “Dzhangal” [“Jungle”] (2016–17). Both of these works admit of multiple readings, but both also crucially resist the punitive and reductive framing of migrants in law in some surprising ways.

Download the article here.

Williams on Sola Scriptura and the Magisterium: Reconciling Two Biblical Analogues of Constitutional Interpretation Through a Judicial Hermeneutic of Storytelling

Telia Mary U. Williams, Northern Illinois University College of Law, has published Sola Scriptura and the Magisterium: Reconciling Two Biblical Analogues of Constitutional Interpretation Through a Judicial Hermeneutic of Storytelling. Here is the abstract.

The validity of the two predominant methods of interpreting the U.S. Constitution has been long and hotly debated. Both of these methods— originalism and living constitutionalism—draw their force from hermeneutics, or methodological principles of interpretation that commonly assist readers of scriptural texts. These divergent constitutional hermeneutic approaches ultimately treat the Constitution as a civic scriptural or holy text, and the multiplicity of interpretations that result from them, largely derive from one of two principal scriptural or Biblical hermeneutical approaches. Indeed, the two principal approaches to constitutional interpretation map onto one of either “sola Scriptura” or Magisterial traditions. Sola Scriptura denotes the ethos of determining the meaning and purpose of a text apart from any authorial imperative, whereas a magisterial tradition determines the meaning and purpose of a text by way of a predetermined and dispositive authority. Importantly, and fundamentally, both approaches repose authority in a Magisterium writ large to settle the meaning of their respective sacred texts. (In the case of the Constitution, that Magisterium is reposed in the United States Supreme Court). However, that legal scholars and courts (perhaps unwittingly) employ biblical or theological modes to arrive at a constitutional interpretation, forecloses other, non-sectarian hermeneutical modes that assist judges, particularly those who preside over lower jurisdiction courts, to decide cases. Speaking as a judge pro tempore in a limited jurisdiction state court, as well as a tenure-track law professor at a state school, I propose that an alternative methodology of interpretation of storytelling may serve to honor both text and community. A “judicial hermeneutic” of storytelling may reconcile the enduring (and unproductive) “religious” dichotomy of constitutional interpretation and better address the cause of justice in everyday constitutional matters. Apart from possibly mitigating the dilemma of interpretation, such an approach may also promote a multiplicity of meaning, and a greater plurality of voices in this constitutional arena.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

McCaffrey and Dorobat on First Principles on the Final Frontier: Economic Foundations of Science Fiction

Matthew McCaffrey, University of Manchester, Manchester Business School, and Carmen-Elena Dorobat, Manchester Business School, Strategy Enterprise and Sustainbility, have published First Principles on the Final Frontier: Economic Foundations of Science Fiction Television. Here is the abstract.

Paul Cantor pioneered the use of Austrian economics in literary criticism, showing not only how sound economic reasoning can be used to interpret literary texts, but also how it helps us to appreciate such texts as celebrations of commercial culture. To honor Cantor's work, in this chapter we apply some fundamental economic principles to boldly go where no one has gone before: modern science fiction. We explore several ways in which sci-fi television shows spanning several decades—such as Battlestar Galactica and The Expanse, as well as Star Trek: The Next Generation, Firefly, and Andor—incorporate economic principles and use them as sources of dramatic tension. These principles include scarcity, division of labor and autarky, trade and prices, protectionism and war, and the role of international (or perhaps, interstellar) organizations in promoting peace and prosperity.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Harrison on The First State to Ratify the United States Constitution

Alan Harrison (no affiliation provided to SSRN), has published The First State to Ratify the United States Constitution. Here is the abstract.

Delaware became the first state to ratify the United States Constitution because the small group of oligarchs who ran Delaware politics not only recognized the state’s dire financial situation and internal political turmoil, but were also able to direct the Philadelphia Convention and the ratification process so as to rapidly obtain effective relief for the underlying causes of that situation. In particular, the acceptance of the national debt by the newly-formed United States alleviated the problems of requisitions on states by Congress. Furthermore, provisions for uniform national currency promised to relieve the hardships of a barter economy, as well as the problem of state currencies secured by real property. Finally, the preservation of “one state, one vote” in the United States Senate mollified the political class and allowed Delaware’s financial interests to progress.

Download the essay from SSRN at the link.

Call For Interest, International Handbook of Legal Language and Communication: From Text to Semiotics, Section 52: Digital Transition of Contemporary Societies and Legal Adaptation

From Anne Wagner, Research Associate Professor, Université du Littoral Côte d’Opale (CGU Calais)

Call for Interests: Section 52 — Digital Transition of Contemporary Societies and Legal Adaptation

 

 

INTERNATIONAL HANDBOOK OF LEGAL LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION: From Text to Semiotics.

 

https://meteor.springer.com/ihllc

 

 

Section Editors: Le Cheng & Ming Hu

 

We invite scholars and practitioners to express their interest in contributing to Section 52: Digital Transition of Contemporary Societies and Legal Adaptation, edited by Le Cheng (chengle163@hotmail.com) and Ming Hu (hm606@zju.edu.cn). This section is part of an expansive Handbook designed as an encyclopedia with nearly 1,000 chapters. Each entry goes beyond a standard encyclopedic summary to offer a substantive and reflective contribution, grounded in existing literature but shaped by the author’s unique research perspective.

 

This section investigates how digital transformation is reshaping contemporary legal systems. It considers how the transition toward digital governance, online commerce, and AI-driven technologies challenges traditional legal structures. By focusing on issues such as digital contracts, e-governance, and automation in the legal field, this section highlights the need for laws that are adaptable to the speed of digital innovation and the societal shift toward a fully integrated digital landscape.

 

Potential topics include:

 

Digital Governance and Law: Exploration of e-government initiatives and the digitization of public services, focusing on the legal frameworks that support digital administration.

Automation in Legal Practice: Impact of AI and digital tools on legal procedures, contracts, and decision-making, including the ethical and regulatory challenges posed by automation.

Digital Contracts and Transactions: The transition from traditional to digital contracts, addressing issues of enforceability, consent, and cross-border legal challenges in e-commerce.

Societal Shifts in Digital Law: The evolving legal landscape as societies transition toward digital living, with a focus on emerging rights, privacy, and security concerns.

Contributions should present established knowledge clearly and accessibly, ideally with a personal angle and an original analytical lens, while maintaining scholarly rigor. The Handbook aims to serve both newcomers and experienced readers alike.

 

If you are interested in contributing to this section, please reach out directly to the section editors by 15 August 2025:

Le Cheng – chengle163@hotmail.com

Ming Hu – hm606@zju.edu.cn

 

We look forward to your engagement in this important and timely conversation.

 

Grossman and Friedman on The Quick and the Dead: The Uses and Misuses of History in Abortion Jurisprudence

ICYMI: Joanna L. Grossman, Southern Methodist University School of Law, and Lawrence M. Friedman, Stanford University School of Law, have published The Quick and the Dead: The Uses and Misuses of History in Abortion Jurisprudence at 46 Women's Rts. L. Rep. 1 (2024).

On June 24, 2022, a solid conservative majority of justices on the United States Supreme Court decided that the time had come to overrule Roe v. Wade, and it did so in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The opinion in Roe, according to the majority in Dobbs, “was egregiously wrong from the start.” And the time had come to get rid of it once and for all. There was no constitutional right to an abortion, according to the majority. In the Court’s words, “the authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives.” Dobbs is and will remain controversial. Abortion is clearly a major issue, politically speaking, with strong passions on both sides. Roe v. Wade itself was also controversial from the very beginning. Abortion had been a contested matter before that decision; and Roe itself was never accepted by a large minority of Americans, particularly in the South. Both sides in the abortion controversy have appealed to the historical record. The Dobbs majority opinion relies on the criminalization of abortion in the second half of the nineteenth century to conclude that abortion cannot be recognized as a fundamental right under the Fourteenth Amendment. In this article, we want to re-examine that history. It would be naïve to think that historical considerations made a crucial difference in the Dobbs decision (despite what the opinion claims); or that it will be decisive in a related dispute over the Comstock Act and the legality of abortion pills. But historical rhetoric has been a prominent tool in the abortion dispute; and this makes it worthwhile to pick apart the historical arguments. Yet this is not only, or primarily, a study in legal history. It is a study of the shape and meaning of the abortion controversy over time. It is a study of how the social context molded that controversy, in the past, and in the present. The goal is to broaden our understanding, first, of the abortion issue, and beyond that, how politics, religion, ideology, and other factors bear on the question of unborn life. The aim is objectivity—if that is possible. We will first consider the particular ways in which history was deemed relevant to the majority’s ruling in Dobbs and note the historical claims that are contested or even obviously wrong. Then, we will get to the heart of the article, in which we examine the history of abortion law and policy in social context. This analysis lays bare the absurdity of grounding constitutional rights in “history,” when laws and policies are plucked from their social context and dropped into a world that would have been unrecognizable to those who lived at the relevant time in history. Abortion is, as before, a controversial issue. History, as we said, cannot convince either side that their view is right and the other view wrong. What it can do is shine the light of scholarship on the history of this controversy, with as much rigor as the subject allows. When we do this, the historical arguments in the Dobbs opinion seem more and more irrelevant. Those arguments, we have argued, were based on a profound misreading of the social context in which the abortion issue in Victorian times played out. Today, we live in a very different world. The terms of the debate in the nineteenth century are not the terms of today. They are in fact, as we tried to show in this article, essentially obsolete.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Keyes on the Evolution of Legislative Drafting Style in English

John Mark Keyes, University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, has published Evolution of Legislative Drafting Style in English. Here is the abstract.

This paper reviews the evolution of legislative drafting style in English beginning in the Middle Ages in England through to modern reforms adopted by the national drafting offices of Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand. It concludes there is remarkable similarity in the styles adopted by these offices with the exception of some of the more debatable techniques proposed to enhance the readability of legislation.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Shanks-Dumont on Godzilla Cinema and the Imaginal Legal History of Ecocide

Daimeon Shanks-Dumont, University of California, Berkeley, is publishing Godzilla Cinema and the Imaginal Legal History of Ecocide in volume 36 of the Yale J.L. & Human. (forthcoming 2025). Here is the abstract.

This Article develops a theory of imaginal legal history in the service of recovering aspects of social phenomena that are habitually suppressed in contemporary modes of legal history. It offers a retrospective account of the emerging international crime of ecocide through the use of unlikely source material: Godzilla cinema. Through the use of moving images, this history surfaces latent meaning within the concept of ecocide that has been concealed in traditional narratives, namely an anthropocentric grounding that is at odds with its self-professed environmentalism. The Article is divided into two main Parts. The first lays out a speculative theory of imaginal history. It begins by considering how images operate in and through legal practices and materials as a general matter of symbolic ordering, before moving on to discuss what the concept of the imaginal offers legal-historical study. It critiques the dominate modality of professional historiography, contextualism, and the reduction of narrative that is a result of the hegemony of the written word. It then outlines a novel methodological paradigm—imaginal legal history—that promises a way out of the obsession with radical contingency that has arrested legal history since its encounter with critical legal studies in the 1980s. The second Part is an attempt to operationalize imaginal legal history with film—to create what Walter Benjamin called a “critical constellation”—to better appreciate current efforts to leverage international law to address the climate crisis. It begins by explaining why Godzilla cinema is an apt repository of moving images with which to engage the histories of international law, arguing that the genre’s global scope, international scale, and deep inventory of symbolic imagery and fantasy recommend it as a tool of imaginal legal history. It then analyzes a foundational moment in international environmental law’s history in the 1960s and 1970s—the invention of the concept of ecocide, the beginning of the modern environmental movement, and the articulation of environmental consciousness in American jurisprudence. Finally, the Article “reads” the 1971 film, Godzilla vs. Hedorah, and what its imagery, symbolism, and structure reveals of contemporaneous and current environmental and legal consciousness. The dénouement comes in the Conclusion, which takes the montage of images brought forward in the Article, dissolved of their contexts, and through a critical interpretation integrates them in ecocide’s horizons of meaning. A short Coda to the text follows, meditating on a materialist reading of Godzilla vs. Hedorah, and the traces of the Real that survive in the interstices of the film.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Call For Papers: Anamorphosis--International Journal of Law & Literature

From Dr. Amanda Muniz Oliveira, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora (UFJF)

Call for Papers ANAMORPHOSIS - International Journal of Law & Literature (from Brazil)

Upcoming Issue & Deadlines
Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis;
Earlier submissions receive earlier decisions.

About the Journal
ANAMORPHOSIS is the only Brazilian scholarly periodical entirely devoted to the intersection of Law and the Humanities. Since 2015 it has offered an open forum for rigorous, interdisciplinary dialogue between legal scholarship, literary studies, philosophy, cultural theory and related fields. The journal is fully open-access, charges no article-processing or submission fees, and operates a strict double-blind peer-review system.

What We Publish?
We welcome original, unpublished work (maximum two authors) in any of the following categories:

1. Research Articles: Theoretical or empirical studies that advance the field of Law & Humanities or Cultural Legal Studies; 
2. Translations: Scholarly translations of texts not yet published in Portuguese, accompanied by a critical introduction, aiming to broaden the dissemination of foreign scholarship in Latin America.
3. Reviews:Critical reviews of recent books or landmark works relevant to Law, Humanities, and Cultural Studies.

Doctoral candidates and early-career researchers are especially encouraged to submit.

Languages
Manuscripts may be submitted in English, Spanish, French, Italian, German or Portuguese. 

Approved texts in Portuguese are published with an English translation, and vice-versa; texts in other languages appear alongside a Portuguese translation, broadening readership and impact.

Why Submit to ANAMORPHOSIS?

• No fees - publish without APCs or submission charges.
• Global visibility through respected indexing services and open-access licensing.
• Fast, fair review - editorial screening followed by at least two external reviews.
• Distinguished international board spanning Europe, the Americas and beyond.
• Interdisciplinary reach - engage scholars across legal theory, literature, cultural studies, history, philosophy, the arts and social sciences.

How to Submit

• Register or log in at https://periodicos.rdl.org.br/anamps.
• Follow the five-step submission workflow, ensuring all files are anonymised for double-blind review.
• Adhere to our Author Guidelines (template and style guide available on the website).
• Upload a brief biographical note in a separate file once the paper is accepted.

Contact
Questions about scope or preparation? Write to the Editorial Office at anamps@rdl.org.br or henriete@rdl.org.br We look forward to receiving your contribution and to continuing the conversation between law, literature and society.

Share this call with colleagues, graduate students and research networks interested in the vibrant field of Law & Humanities.

Drumbl on Justice Pal's Legacy: Keynote Lecture

Mark Drumbl, Washington and Lee University School of Law, has published Justice Pal's Legacy: Keynote Lecture. Here is the abstract.

This chapter examines the legacy of Justice Pal's dissent at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. It does so by peering into two sites. One site is postwar Japanese politics and memory. Another site is contemporary international law in the areas of criminality, the environment, and international organization. This chapter examines Justice Pal's footprintsin law and politicsand also counter-intuitively wonders what the world would be like had he not authored his lengthy dissent. Justice Pal was also about much more than his dissent at Tokyo. Hence, this project includes in Justice Pal's legacy footprint his subsequent work with the International Law Commission, along with his scholarly writings on political philosophy and international relations.

Download the essay from SSRN at the link.

Lincoln on Axiomatic Shifting Paradigms: Wittgenstein's Language-Games, Goedel's Incompleteness Theorem, Language, Law, and the Limits of Formalism

Charles Edward Andrew Lincoln, IV, University of Groningen, Faculty of Law, has published Axiomatic Shifting Paradigms: Wittgenstein’s Language-Games, Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem, Language, Law, and the Limits of Formalism at 47 U. Ark. Little Rock L. Rev. 133 (2025). Here is the abstract.

This Article shows how Ludwig Wittgenstein’s idea of “language-games” and Kurt Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorems mark the outer limits of legal formalism and other leading interpretive theories—textualism, originalism, and purposivism. It begins by tracing Wittgenstein’s progression from a “picture theory” of language to the view that social context drives meaning more than any simple correspondence between words and reality. Gödel’s work on formal systems, suggesting that mathematics—long held as the pinnacle of logical certainty—itself cannot be both consistent and complete, reinforces the notion that purely “logical” approaches cannot capture the full range of linguistic and social nuances at play in law. Next, the Article examines how the late-nineteenth-century “scientific” movement in legal education, associated with Harvard Law School, underlies many assumptions about formalism. It then compares textualism, originalism, and purposivism, each grappling—but ultimately unable to resolve—the deep ambiguities that language poses. By exploring examples such as grammar debates, the sorites paradox (on vagueness), and Wittgenstein’s concept of language as shared practice, the Article shows why no interpretive framework can truly eliminate uncertainty or encapsulate the ever-evolving nature of the meaning of legal texts. Finally, the Article proposes a “dialectical sublation” of these rival schools of interpretation. Rather than clinging to the impossible dream of perfect textual clarity, it urges jurists and legal theorists to accept the fluidity and contingency inherent in language—and to build that understanding into their interpretive methods.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Joshi on Judicial Regrets

Yuvraj Joshi, Brooklyn Law School; UCLA Promise Institute of Human Rights; UC Berkeley Miller Institute for Global Challenges and the Law, is publishing Judicial Regrets in volume 99 of the Southern California Law Review (2026). Here is the abstract.

U.S. Supreme Court Justices have often expressed regret about their most consequential rulings and opinions. Chief Justice Earl Warren lamented his 1955 Brown v. Board of Education opinion ordering desegregation “with all deliberate speed”—ambiguous phrasing that ultimately enabled delays in integration. Justice Lewis Powell recanted his 1986 opinion in Bowers v. Hardwick, which upheld a Georgia law criminalizing same-sex intimacy. In Grutter v. Bollinger, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor predicted that affirmative action policies would no longer be needed twenty-five years later—a prediction she later acknowledged was mistaken. These examples, among others discussed in this Article, illustrate that judicial regrets are frequent and poignant, spanning several areas of law. Despite their significance, judicial regrets remain largely unexplored in American legal scholarship. This Article addresses this phenomenon by drawing on multidisciplinary research on regret, previously unpublished judicial survey data, and judicial case studies. It examines how the law might better account for judicial regret and underscores insights about law and judging that stem from deeper understandings of it. Because judicial regret can catalyze legal reforms, rectify past harms, and influence legal interpretations, this Article proposes ways to incorporate it into constitutional interpretation and the treatment of precedent. By contemplating the legal and normative significance of this neglected judicial emotion, this Article aims to help the legal community avoid collectively discounting regret.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Call For Applications, Visiting Fellows 2026, for the Institute for Interdisciplinary Legal Studies, University of Lucerne

Call For Applications: Visiting Fellows 2026

The Institute for Interdisciplinary Legal Studies at the University of Lucerne invites applications for our Visiting Fellows Programme 2026.

 

The fellowship programme supports junior scholars who wish to spend a period of time in Lucerne pursuing work that overlaps with or otherwise complements scholarly activities currently being pursued at the institute. During their stay, fellows enjoy access to our specialist resources, and are invited to share and develop their ideas with our community of faculty, researchers and students.  

 

Tailored to PhD candidates and postdoctoral researchers, the programme is open to all working on interdisciplinary topics at the intersections between law, the humanities and the social sciences. Focusing on critical and theoretical approaches, the institute aims to bring together a diverse group of scholars who read and think widely across fields, contexts and disciplines.

 

The deadline for submissions is Tuesday 30 September 2025.

 

Further details here.

 

For a full list of funding opportunities at the institute, please see here.