[Anthropgrad] Work-in-Progress Seminar - 28 November - Clare Jackson

[Sharon Komidar]

The Research School of Humanities presents,
 Work-in-Progress Seminar Series 

1- 2.30 pm, Friday 28th November, Theatrette, Old Canberra House

EARLY MODERN LEGAL BIOGRAPHY 

Dr. Clare Jackson, Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge

 

Whilst biography remains an ancient, rich and popular - if sometimes
philosophically controversial - genre, legal biography represents a
relatively new sub-genre. This 'work-in-progress' seminar addresses
specific methodological issues raised in writing the biography of an
early modern lawyer, including the epistemological correlation between
an individual's life and their legal contributions; relationships
between concepts of biographical 'truth' and early modern legal
equivocation and forensic rhetoric; difficulties involved in recapturing
the dynamics of seventeenth-century courtroom advocacy and adversarial
trial procedures; the limits of extant archival records and challenges
involved in rendering technical legal argument both accessible and
accurate to non-specialist readerships. 

 

Whilst this paper draws on evidence from a range of early modern legal
biographies, its focus is Dr Jackson's current research into the life
and works of the Scots jurist, Sir George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh
(c.1636-91). The towering figure in late seventeenth-century
intellectual culture, Mackenzie served as Lord Advocate to Charles II
and James II and also sustained an extensive published output of over
thirty major works, ranging across jurisprudence, political theory,
moral philosophy, history and imaginative literature. In Scottish
history, however, his involvement in the vigorous suppression of
nonconformist Presbyterians has ensured that lurid and inaccurate
depictions of 'Bluidy Mackenzie' continue to exert a strong grip over
the popular imagination, as was recently confirmed in a uniquely
gruesome manner, when the desecration of his tomb resulted in the first
conviction in Scots law since the nineteenth century for 'violation of a
sepulchre' (H.M. Advocate v. Devlin, 2004). 

 

Dr. Clare Jackson is Lecturer and Director of Studies in History at
Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge and editor of the Historical
Journal. She is currently a Visiting Fellow at the Research School of
Humanities, ANU.

 

Convenors: Ken Taylor and Stephen Foster
For general enquiries please contact: 
Phone: 6125 2434
Email: administration.rsh at anu.edu.au 
Web: http://rsh.anu.edu.au/
All Welcome