1st Edition

Popular Culture and Law

Edited By Richard K. Sherwin Copyright 2006

    What are the consequences when law's stories and images migrate from the courtroom to the court of public opinion and from movie, television and computer screens back to electronic monitors inside the courtroom itself? What happens when lawyers and public relations experts market notorious legal cases and controversial policy issues as if they were just another commodity? What is the appropriate relationship between law and digital culture in virtual worlds on the Internet? In addressing these cutting edge issues, the essays in this volume shed new light on the current status and future fate of law, truth and justice in our time.

    Contents; Introductory essay: The interpenetration of popular culture and law, Richard K. Sherwin. Law in Popular Culture: Law, lawyers and popular culture, Lawrence M. Friedman; Looking for law in all the old traces: the movies of Classical Hollywood, the law, and case(s) of film noir, Norman Rosenberg; Postcolonial erotic disruptions: legal narratives of culture, sex and nation in India, Ratna Kapur; Living in a Copernican universe: law and fatherhood in a 'perfect world', Austin Sarat. Popular Culture in Law: 'Desperate for love': cinematic influences upon a defendant's closing argument to a jury, Philip N. Meyer; Law frames: historical truth and narrative necessity in a criminal case, Richard K. Sherwin; The impact of factual versus fictional media portrayals on cultural stereotypes, Sheila T. Murphy; Slap leather! Legal culture, Wild Bill Hickok and the gunslinger myth, Steve Lubet. Law as Commodity: A new constitutional regime: the juridico-entertainment complex, Douglas S. Reed: Litigation public relations, Susanne A. Roschwalb and Richard A. Stack; An oil strike in hell: contemporary legends about the civil justice system, Marc Galanter; From law to content in the new media marketplace, Daniel M. Filler. Law in Cyberspace: The laws of virtual worlds, F. Gregory Lastowka and Dan Hunter; Digital speech and democratic culture: a theory of freedom of expression for the information society, Jack M. Balkin. Pop Culture and Law in Theory: Gaining/losing perspective on the law, or keeping visual evidence in perspective, Christopher J. Buccafusco; Toward a legal theory of popular culture, Anthony Chase; Index.

    Biography

    Richard Sherwin is Professor and Director of the Visual Persuasion Project at New York Law School, USA.