Lecture series 'Reconsidering the Socio-Legal Gaze'

Published on 30 September 2021

The Van Vollenhoven Institute is organising a year-long public lecture series entitled 'Reconsidering the Socio-Legal Gaze'. The lecture series aims to spark critical debates about the visions of justice and positions of power that inform Law and Society scholarship at Leiden and beyond.

The series will start this semester with three lectures that will reflect on the birth of socio-legal scholarship in the context of Dutch colonial administration ('Dutch Colonial Foundations').

• 14 October 2021, Dr. Martine van Ittersum (15.30-17.00)
  'Van Vollenhoven and Grotius: Soulmates of Empire' 
   

• 25 November 2021, Prof. Betty de Hart (15.30-17.00)
  'Exploring the Legal Archive on Race: Methodological Challenges'
   

• 9 December 2021, Dr. Upik Djalins (15.30-17.00)
  'The Colonial Bureaucratic Network versus the Metropole: The Origination Story of Land Alienation Prohibition in 1870s  East Indies'

The lectures of the second semester of the academic year will focus on 'Future Horizons' of socio-legal scholarship in the context of three key values that drive contemporary scholarship: decolonization, diversity, and development.

• 13 January 2022, Dr. Mohsen al Attar (13.30-15.00)
  "Decolonising International Law: Entrapments in Praxis and Critical Thought"
   
• 24 February 2022, Dr. Nina Holvast and Dr. Willem-Jan Kortleven (15.30 - 17.00)
  "Legal socialization in law school: two types of professional identity formation and their impact on inclusion and diversity"
   
• 14 April 2022, Dr Luis Eslava (15.30 - 17.00)
  "Difference and empire, or on the importance of thinking otherwise"

The lecture series is organised by the Van Vollenhoven Institute Diversity and Inclusion Committee, the first of its kind at Leiden Law School.