Towards a Sexuate Jurisprudence and on the ‘Second Rape’ of Law

Gender and Law at Durham (GLAD) are delighted to host Dr Yvette Russell.

In recent work I seek to interrogate what survivors of sexual violence and the criminal justice system refer to as the ‘second rape’ of the courtroom. What does it mean to claim that one has been raped by the law after giving evidence in a trial to seek justice in the aftermath of sexual violence? I argue that the ontological force of law is profoundly nihilistic and that if we are to understand the ‘second rape’ of law in cases of sexual violence, we need to interrogate law’s investment in the simultaneous expulsion and invocation of sexual difference, and its role in engendering the material becoming of the subjects in the rape trial. In this paper I consider the conditions under which we might move towards a sexuate jurisprudence in which the law is orientated towards life and intersubjectivity and through which it might be possible to express the harm of sexual violence without such grave consequences for those naming it.

Dr Jane Rooney and Joy Twemlow from GLAD will respond to Dr Russell’s talk. 

Dr Yvette Russell is Associate Professor of Law and Feminist Theory at the University of Bristol Law School. Her research is broadly in the areas of feminist philosophy and criminal law, and she writes about sexual violence and the law in England and Wales.  She is the Editor-in-Chief of Feminist Legal Studies and a 2021-22 Leverhulme Trust Research Fellow.

The event will take place in person and online. Please register here. Please note that in-person registration closes on 27 October 2021. Online registration is available until the day itself.