Locating Law (Second Edition)

Race / Class / Gender / Sexuality Connections (2nd Edition)

Edited by Elizabeth Comack

One primary concern within the study of law has been to understand the law/society relation. Underlying this concern is the belief that law has a distinctly social basis; it both shapes and is shaped by the society in which it operates. This book explores the law/society relation by locating law within the nexus of race/class/gender/sexuality relations in society. Recognizing that inequalities along these lines exist in society raises important questions: What role has law historically played in generating today’s inequalities? Is law part of the problem or part of the solution? Can we use law as a strategy to achieve meaningful change? The essays in this new edition of Locating Law demonstrate law’s role in a variety of specific contexts, including perpetuating colonialism in Canada, protecting corporations and holding women responsible for sexual violence against them. These analyses are sure to generate discussion and debate and, in the process, enhance our understanding of this important relation between law and society.

Praise for the first edition: “This unique collection of essays always opens up discussion and debate on many compelling issues in the sociology of law... students are challenged to think critically about the relations between law and society. Locating Law is an essential text for undergraduate students in sociology and criminology. -CATHY FILLMORE, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF WINNIPEG

Contents

• Introduction 
• PART 1–THEORETICAL APPROACHES IN THE SOCIOLOGY OF LAW 
• PART 2–RACISM AND THE LAW 
• PART 3-CLASS INTERESTS AND THE LAW INTRODUCTION 
• PART 4–GENDER, SEXUALITY, AND THE LAW INTRODUCTION

About the Author

Elizabeth Comack is Professor and Head of the Department of Sociology at the University of Manitoba. She received her Ph.D in sociology from the University of Alberta, her M.A. from Queens University and B.A.(Honours) from the University of Winnipeg.

Elizabeth’s research interests fall within two main areas: the sociology of law and feminist criminology. Over the past three decades she has written and conducted research on a variety of topics: the origins of Canadian drug laws; the capital punishment debate; the legal recognition of the ‘Battered Woman Syndrome’;  the abuse histories of women in prison; violence, inequality, and the law; safety and security issues in Winnipeg’s inner-city communities; and masculinity, violence, and prisoning.  Her current research projects stem from her involvement in a SSHRC/CURA project, under the auspices of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives-Manitoba (CCPA-MB), entitled “Transforming Aboriginal and Inner-City Communities.”  In one of these projects, now underway, she and Nahanni Fontaine of the Southern Chiefs’ Organization (SCO) are interviewing Aboriginal peoples about their experiences with the police.

Elizabeth’s teaching regularly includes third-year courses in the department’s Criminology Program (Sociology of Law, and Women, Crime and Social Justice) as well as graduate seminars in the Sociology of Law and Feminist Criminology. She has also taught Feminism and Sociological Theory, at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as the Honours Thesis Seminar.

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