Law

Law and Resistance 1

Module code: M5115
Level 6
15 credits in autumn semester
Teaching method: Seminar
Assessment modes: Portfolio

We will focus on the themes of race, class and gender struggles, and how law responds to these.

There are two Law and Resistance modules. Together, these are intended to give you a comprehensive and innovative understanding of critical legal approaches to law and resistance. These are sometimes called ‘alternatives’ to the ‘properly legal’ perspective of legal positivism.

This module is split into ‘critical perspectives’ on resistance and ‘aw and’ perspectives (for example law and ethics, law and race). You may be taking both modules or only this one.

We will be challenging your preconceptions about what law is and how resistance happens. We will be asking the question of not only ‘what is law’ but:

• ‘How’ does law come to have the force it has?
• Is law about power? About violence and/or disorder?
• What roles do gender, race and class play in how we experience the law? 
• What roles do gender, race and class play in how we experience the law?

The course is taught via case studies that include the Black Lives Matter protests, decolonising the curriculum and gender-based violence.

Module learning outcomes

• Demonstrate a deep and systematic understanding of the history, relevance and contemporary significance of jurisprudence and legal theory in relation to power and resistance
• Explain and critically evaluate different doctrinal and philosophical approaches to law and theories of power and resistance
• Systematically appreciate the relationship between theoretical approaches in legal theory and the practical application of the law, by understanding this relationship as a form of resistance (ie critique).
• Extend and apply theoretical knowledge to a substantive area of law