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LAWS SEXUAL DISCIPLINE - VISIBILITY, VIOLENCE, AND CONSENT
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UNSPECIFIED (1995) LAWS SEXUAL DISCIPLINE - VISIBILITY, VIOLENCE, AND CONSENT. JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIETY, 22 (3). pp. 326-352.
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Abstract
This article will examine how aspects of the text of the criminal law function to discipline the body. Its central argument is that the power of the criminal law in respect of physical and sexual violence is not merely or even mainly juridical but, more importantly, disciplinary. As a disciplinary power, these aspects of the law's text demarcate the boundary between the normal and the abnormal and, in doing so, they define the normal around the notion of the heterosexual male subject in two principal ways: first, by a concept of consent which is very differently constructed as between offences and, secondly, by a subtext of visibility which privileges visible physical violence over (often) invisible sexual violence. The law disciplines bodies differentially as between different genders and different sexual orientations.
The theoretical framework of the study is developed from Michel Foucault's theory of disciplinary power and, to a lesser extent, from Luce Irigaray's theory of sexual difference. The elements of the theory will be set out in the first part of the paper and the argument will be pursued through the precedent cases and the statutes of the criminal and evidential law relating to the offences of common assault, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, grievous bodily harm,(1) rape, and indecent assault. These are all offences to which consent can(2) be a defence.
Item Type: | Journal Item | ||||
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Subjects: | K Law [LC] H Social Sciences > HM Sociology |
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Journal or Publication Title: | JOURNAL OF LAW AND SOCIETY | ||||
Publisher: | BLACKWELL PUBL LTD | ||||
ISSN: | 0263-323X | ||||
Official Date: | September 1995 | ||||
Dates: |
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Volume: | 22 | ||||
Number: | 3 | ||||
Number of Pages: | 27 | ||||
Page Range: | pp. 326-352 | ||||
Publication Status: | Published |
Data sourced from Thomson Reuters' Web of Knowledge
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