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Law Legal History

Impersonations

Troubling the Person in Law and Culture

by (author) Sheryl Hamilton

Publisher
University of Toronto Press
Initial publish date
Jun 2009
Category
Legal History, Gender & the Law
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780802098467
    Publish Date
    Jun 2009
    List Price
    $75.00
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781442616066
    Publish Date
    Apr 2013
    List Price
    $41.95
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781442669642
    Publish Date
    Jun 2013
    List Price
    $31.95

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Description

Personhood is considered at once a sign of legal-political status and of socio-cultural agency, synonymous with the rational individual, subject, or citizen. Yet, in an era of life-extending technologies, genetic engineering, corporate social responsibility, and smart technology, the definition of the person is neither benign nor uncontested. Boundaries that previously worked to secure our place in the social order are blurring as never before. What does it mean, then, to be a person in the twenty-first century?

In Impersonations, Sheryl N. Hamilton uses five different kinds of persons - corporations, women, clones, computers, and celebrities - to discuss the instability of the concept of personhood and to examine some of the ways in which broader social anxieties are expressed in these case studies. She suggests that our investment in personhood is greater now than it has been for years, and that our ongoing struggle to define the term is evident in law and popular culture. Using a cultural studies of law approach, the author examines important issues such as whether the person is a gender-neutral concept based on individual rights, the relationship between personhood and the body, and whether persons can be property.

Impersonations is a highly original study that brings together legal, philosophical, and cultural expressions of personhood to enliven current debates about our place in the world.

About the author

Sheryl N. Hamilton is an associate professor in the Department of Law and the School of Journalism and Communication at Carleton University.

Sheryl Hamilton's profile page

Awards

  • Winner, Canadian Law and Society Association Annual Book Prize
  • Short-listed, G.J. Robinson Book Prize awarded by Canadian Communication Association