University Challenge
University Challenge: the gentlemanly gaze.
academics of law in University therefore, is to address this legacy, mindful that the intention was ‘to pull down rather than build up’ a stifling tradition of Aristotelian thought. So I asked Dr Sarah Corbett, Associate Professor at The University of Law and Criminal Defence Barrister to discuss her approach; she is well placed not least because her doctoral research explores how criminal law and evidence construct gendered and racialised legal subjects. In a short extract from a longer conversation, I ask her to talk about the ways in which her teaching seeks to challenge the ‘gentlemanly gaze’ of the enlightenment legacy.
'Clandestine conversation circles in the 17th century challenged the status quo'
A
ll lawyers learn about the 17th century coffee shops in London where ‘enlightenment thinking’ influenced the development of law as much as any other sector of society. The coffee shop conversations were exclusively for gentleman. The coffee shops were periodically subject to forced closures due to the topics being promoted which directly challenged the status quo, for example, arguments for religious toleration during a time of violent schisms. As a result, gentlemen scholars moved to clandestine locations in exile to hold conversation circles where they sought to replace notions of Aristotelian certainty with probability and reasonableness, values that became the foundation to the UK common law system. The conversational circles had rules, handwritten in Latin by the English philosopher and political theorist, John Locke; to practise a Ciceronian ethic of civilita towards each speaker; to take turns in the conversation; to be constructively critical; to be self-aware; and not to rebuke unless absolutely necessary, but to impose silence upon any member of the circle who fell victim to his own ‘enthusiasms’. What emerged from these exclusionary conversation circles was a code of gentlemanly conduct, reflected for centuries in the City’s term ‘My word is my bond’. The values nurtured and respected were ‘truthfulness’ and ‘honour’ privileging ‘birth wealth and virtue’ - a paradigm that has deeply impacted on how the law today evaluates evidence in court. The original ambition of the men of letters was a ‘Commonwealth of Learning’; a progressive endeavour for the time. However, many historians of law have charted the patriarchal and colonial legacy of the ‘gentlemanly gaze’ which pervades legal knowledge and practice today. The challenge for feminist 12 | LegalWomen
MB: Does the Equality Act 2010 deal with the legacy of the development of our law, in particular, does it adequately cover aspects of intersectionality? Sarah: I think the intersectionality aspect highlights the complex way in which things get played out. So you know, for Black women it’s not just the fact they experience sexism, but that they experience it in a different way to white women and experience racism in a different way to black men. I think that the key point about intersectionality is the way that it plays out in the context of colonialism and racial capitalism, particularly neoliberalism. The vast majority of cases take place in the lower courts, whereas students tend to consider Supreme Court. These higher court decisions don’t necessarily reflect what is happening on the ground for the marginalised communities, such as their experiences of racialised stop and search. MB: So are you saying the idea of intersectionality has not trickled down into practice? Sarah: I think the law is making changes, but it can be quite surface change that does not necessarily get to the heart of the matter. MB: How do you draw on your own professional experience as a Criminal Defence Barrister teaching prospective lawyers, to address this complexity? Sarah: I might ask them to consider how the law has a tendency to divide women into binary categories of either victim or offender. I have observed this dynamic as a criminal defence lawyer, where women I have represented may be victims of male violence; sometimes they’ve been coerced into committing offences or fought back against a violent partner, or got pressured into prostitution and had to deal with violent partners who are also their pimps. Many of the women may also have a problem with class A drugs, or come from marginalised areas of society, have grown up in care, or have experienced sexual abuse often as a child but also as an adult and because of this, they’re in situations very dangerous to their physical and mental health. Then their life choices can be extremely limited. So I point out that there’s often an overlap between suffering harm and getting into trouble themselves. I try to encourage discussion of how and why the criminal justice system seeks to draw these false binary divides between women as offenders and women as victims. MB: And in terms of men? Sarah: Similarly, if you are framing individual men as a danger, I think we have to look at how we conceptualise sexual harm
