The Law Is a White Dog: How Legal Rituals Make and Unmake Persons

by Colin Dayan

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Book cover for The Law Is a White Dog

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Abused dogs, prisoners tortured in Guantanamo and supermax facilities, or slaves killed by the state--all are deprived of personhood through legal acts. Such deprivations have recurred throughout history, and the law sustains these terrors and banishments even as it upholds the civil order. Examining such troubling cases, The Law Is a White Dog tackles key societal questions: How does the law construct our identities? How do its rules and sanctions make or unmake persons? And how do the supposedly rational claims of the law define marginal entities, both natural and supernatural, including ghosts, dogs, slaves, terrorist suspects, and felons?...Read more
  • ISBN10 0691157871
  • ISBN13 9780691157870
  • Publish Date 3 March 2013 (first published 7 February 2011)
  • Publish Status Active
  • Publish Country US
  • Imprint Princeton University Press