Acclaimed UC Berkeley professor to join UEL

Published

04 March 2024

One of the world's leading figures studying legal rhetoric and philosophy is to become a visiting professor at the University of East London (UEL). Marianne Constable is a professor at the Department of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley. She’ll be joining UEL’s Centre for Justice, Law and Society (CJLS) at the Royal Docks School of Business and Law, where she’ll serve as a visiting professor until the beginning of May. She brings with her a wealth of expertise from one of the most prestigious universities in the United States.

Professor Constable is a widely interdisciplinary legal scholar whose work intersects with both the humanities and the social sciences. She is the author of three books, Our Word is Our Bond: How Legal Speech Acts, Just Silences: the Limits and Possibilities of Modern Law and The Law of the Other: The Mixed Jury and Changes in Conceptions of Citizenship, Law and Knowledge. The latter won the Law and Society Association's J. Willard Hurst Prize in Legal History. She has also co-edited two other books on law and society.

An expert on law and language, she has written numerous articles on a wide variety of topics, such as the French philosopher Foucault’s attitude towards state power and how that relates to immigration law, Nietzsche and jurisprudence, the rhetoric of "community," law in the liberal arts and language in politics. She is currently completing a history of the "new unwritten law" that ostensibly exonerated women who killed their husbands in Chicago a hundred years ago.

Qudsia Mirza, Senior Lecturer and Co-Director of the CJLS said Professor Constable’s arrival would have a real impact on the centre. She said, "This is a real coup for the CJLS. Professor Constable's visit promises to enrich the academic environment and foster collaborative opportunities within the university community."

For more information on Professor Constable's background and her academic achievements, please visit her profile on the UC Berkeley website.

The CLJS supports and develops scholarly activity, research, and research-led teaching in the Royal Docks School of Business and Law. It focuses on the study of law, institutions, and governance in the context of current societal issues and challenges. It adopts a critical, multidisciplinary perspective and a local, regional and global focus.

For further enquiries, please contact Co-Directors of the CJLS Qudsia Mirza: q.mirza@uel.ac.uk and Dr Annalisa Meloni a.meloni@uel.ac.uk, or visit the CJLS webpage.

The Royal Docks School of Business and Law is home to many courses including LLB Hons Law.