Forensic cultures in historical perspective: Technologies of witness, testimony, judgment (and justice (original) (raw)
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Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 2020
This volume makes a contribution to the historical and interdisciplinary assessment of forensics, placing a special emphasis on the growth and development of its practices around the globe. As Hamlin points out in the introduction, forensics are often marginalized in legal historians' accounts because of a tendency to explore law through cases and legislation rather than search for its quotidian implementation-or, similarly, to treat policing in ways which obscure its regular practices and routines. Not only does this volume correct this marginalization of forensic practices from wider accounts of modern public institutions, it displays an inspiring engagement with archival and other historical methodologies.
Academic Forensic Pathology, 2021
Growing attention to the philosophy of forensic science in recent decades has sometimes included the question: "what kind of science is forensic science"? Yet there has been little discussion of how that question has been differently construed in terms of period, place, and prevailing anxieties. Following an examination of the unique character this question must have in an American legal context, this article reviews three modes/phases of response, rooted successively in individual authority, comprehensive method, and institutions of flexible problem-solving. The conclusion applies this complex legacy in two ways: first to clarify areas of incoherence and tension in recent attempts to underwrite forensic sciences, and second to supply a fuller framework for Max Houck's argument for the essentially historical character of forensic science.
Introducing 'Forensic Cultures'
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C, 2013
In the summer of 2010 the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester hosted the U.K.’s first conference dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of forensic science and medicine. Forensic Cultures brought together scholars from a range of fields to discuss the remarkable prominence of forensic science and medicine in contemporary culture. The organisers coined the term “forensic cultures” to mark out this objective, and to serve as flexible container for its pursuit. It was hoped that the very flexibility of the term (in its singular and still more so in its plural form) would provide an enabling intellectual medium within which to nurture a genuinely interdisciplinary conversation. The first trial of “forensic cultures” was a success: the conference papers exemplified the variety of topics and approaches enabled by forensics as an object of inquiry, and at the final session convened to discuss a possible edited volume, the participants endorsed the term as a useful heuristic for rethinking contributions in light of their experience at the event.
Review Essay of The Emergence of Historical Forensic Expertise: Clio Takes the Stand by V. Petrovic
Journal of International Criminal Justice, 2018
The Emergence of Historical Forensic Expertise is an instructive intellectual journey through the interplay of history and law whose relevance extends well beyond its basic framework of a historical study. A cross-disciplinary outlook between the historical science and legal practice adopted and effectively applied by Petrović can become an indispensable guide through the highest and lowest points of historical science as a forensic discipline in domestic and international criminal trials.
Forensic science – A true science
Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences, 2011
While the US jurisprudence of the 1993 Daubert hearing requires judges to question not only the methodology behind, but also the principles governing, a body of knowledge to qualify it as scientific, can forensic science, based on Locard's and Kirk's Principles, pretend to this higher status in the courtroom? Moving away from the disputable American legal debate, this historical and philosophical study will screen the relevance of the different logical epistemologies to recognize the scientific status of forensic science. As a consequence, the authors are supporting a call for its recognition as a science of its own, defined as the science of identifying and associating traces for investigative and security purposes, based on its fundamental principles and the case assessment and interpretation process that follows with its specific and relevant mode of inference.
The Emergence of Historical Forensic Expertise: Clio takes the Stand (excerpt)
Routledge, 2017
This book scrutinizes the emergence of historical forensic contribution in some of the most important national and international legal ventures of the last century. It aims to advance the debate from discussions on whether his- torians should testify or not toward nuanced understanding of the history of the practice and making the best out of its performance in the future.
The Historical Nature of Forensic Inference
This paper examines the role of history in forensic inference. It maintains that forensic reasoning has a structure that is understandable only if we pay attention to the evolution of inference in adjudication. In developing this point, a distinction is made between two types of history, and it is argued that both histories are crucial to the validity and cogency of forensic conclusions.
The Cultural Afterlife of Criminal Evidence
Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice
This article explores what happens to criminal evidence after the conclusion of legal proceedings, described here as the afterlife of evidence. The text investigates the ways that this material proliferates in the shadow of the law, in both cultural and commercial contexts. During the criminal trial, the rules of evidence and criminal procedure operate to tightly regulate the collection, admissibility, and interpretation of evidence. After the criminal trial, these rules no longer control evidence, and this material is sometimes subject to the substantial cultural curiosity associated with true crime and its artifacts. This article sets out some of the new questions that are posed by this material when it is transferred beyond the law’s control.