Law and Society

Catalog description

s: Law and society refers broadly to an interdisciplinary approach to the study of law which examines law and legal institutions sociologically and through the lenses of various models of jurisprudence and legal reasoning. Now more than ever we must understand the ways in which law invades and impacts all aspects of our lives, examine the social-historical context of important legal decisions, and how political, economic, and social factors influence law. Law is also now the battle ground on which contemporary culture wars are fought, for example, gay marriage and the war on terror's infringement on civil liberties. We will ask how the law on the books compares with the law in action, applying a critical perspective to understand the relations between law and politics, the criminal justice system, the economy, stratification, culture, ideology, legal education, and social change. Topics we will cover include civil rights, the right to privacy, reproductive issues, sexuality, the civil liability explosion, the death penalty.