Leif Dahlberg

Pirates, Partisans, and Politico-Juridical Space

Abstract The essay discusses the liquid spatiality that characterizes the activities of the pirate, the juridical liquid space that is created in his or her wake, and reactions to pirate activity that in various ways attempt to territorialize the open sea. The essay also considers the ways in which the activities of modern pirates affect the relationship between the juridical and the political. The focus is on legal, cultural, and political relationships between activities and spatialities, and in particular on the relationship between solid and liquid states. Although the perspective is mainly that of intellectual history, the essay also discusses some recent historical events, in particular the legal processes against the Swedish file-sharing site The Pirate Bay.

On the Open and Closed Space of Public Discourse

Abstract The subject of this article is to investigate the notion and status of public discourse in contemporary media. The article opens with a reading of the trope the ‘open’ (das Offene) in Rainer Maria Rilke’s eighth Duineser Elegie and then discusses the meanings given to openess and public (Öffentlich, Öffentlichkeit) in the academic discourses of law, philosophy, political theory, and sociology. However, the principal focus of the article is on the artistic and political interventions by two Austrian artists, Otto Mittmannsgruber and Martin Strauß, made in commercialized public spaces in Austria and Germany during the years 1995-2004. Their artistic works directly address issues of power and public discourse, and effect both a questioning of unilinear mass media communication and a politicization of commercialized public space. In the article it is argued that the interventions of Mittmannsgruber and Strauß in commercial mass media make strikingly visible the simultaneously open and closed nature of contemporary public discourse.

A Modern Trial: A Study of the Use of Video-Recorded Testimonies in the Swedish Court of Appeal

The essay studies the introduction and use of audio-visual media in contemporary Swedish courtroom praxis and how this affects social interaction and the constitution of judicial space. The background to the study is the increasing use of video technology in law courts during the last decennium, and in particular the reformed trial code regulating court proceedings introduced in Sweden in 2008. The reform is called A Modern Trial (En modernare rattegang, Proposition 2004/05:131). An important innovation is that testimonies in lower level court proceedings now are video recorded and, in case of an appeal trial, then are screened in the appellate court. The study of social interaction and the constitution of judicial space in the essay is based in part on an ethnographic study of the Stockholm appellate court (Svea hovratt) conducted in the fall 2010; in part on a study of the preparatory works to the legal reform; and in part on research on how media technology affects social interaction and the constitution of space and place.

Focus: Gardens of Justice

Before entering this special issue of Pólemos, let us ponder different possible interpretations of the garden metaphor. The garden metaphor primarily refers to concrete places and spaces where Justice – “the constant and perpetual will to render every one his due” (Justinian) – is implemented or implicated. Thus a court of Justice is the place where adjudication takes place. A court is defined as an enclosed space, situated either on the inside or on the outside of a building. The word “court” comes from Latin cohort, meaning a group of men, stemming from co+hort-, as in hortus, “garden.”1 Figuratively speaking, a court may signify a “garden of men.” Although a court may include a garden, a garden has quite different connotations than a court. Like a court, a garden is either in front of or behind a house,

Gardens of Justice

Before entering this special issue of Pólemos, let us ponder different possible interpretations of the garden metaphor. The garden metaphor primarily refers to concrete places and spaces where Justice – “the constant and perpetual will to render every one his due” (Justinian) – is implemented or implicated. Thus a court of Justice is the place where adjudication takes place. A court is defined as an enclosed space, situated either on the inside or on the outside of a building. The word “court” comes from Latin cohort, meaning a group of men, stemming from co+hort-, as in hortus, “garden.”1 Figuratively speaking, a court may signify a “garden of men.” Although a court may include a garden, a garden has quite different connotations than a court. Like a court, a garden is either in front of or behind a house,

Gardens of justice

Before entering this special issue of Pólemos, let us ponder different possible interpretations of the garden metaphor. The garden metaphor primarily refers to concrete places and spaces where Justice – “the constant and perpetual will to render every one his due” (Justinian) – is implemented or implicated. Thus a court of Justice is the place where adjudication takes place. A court is defined as an enclosed space, situated either on the inside or on the outside of a building. The word “court” comes from Latin cohort, meaning a group of men, stemming from co+hort-, as in hortus, “garden.”1 Figuratively speaking, a court may signify a “garden of men.” Although a court may include a garden, a garden has quite different connotations than a court. Like a court, a garden is either in front of or behind a house,

Before the Temple of Justice: Reading Roman Law Reading

This article argues against the view that Roman law consciously resisted or even rejected the philosophical approach found in Greek thought and that it conceived and pursued legal scholarship in an ...

Put a Tiger in Your Text

Abstract The subject of this article is the extensive use of metalepsis as an argumentative and rhetorical device in media discourse, and in particular in advertising. Metalepsis, a form of metonymy, sets up an inverted relation – causal, logical or contiguous – between terms and/or objects, either as an aesthetic effect or a means of persuasion. The first part of the article discusses the use of metalepsis in literature and film; the second part discusses the use of the figure in mass media and advertising; the third part discusses the relation between advertising, art, and popular culture. The final part of the article discusses the pervasive use metalepsis in advertising. Since metalepsis is a powerful rhetorical device, I have chosen the figure of the tiger to illustrate how it operates in advertising and media discourse.