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Full-Text Articles in Law
‘Affluent’ Justice: The Role Of Ses In Sentencing Severity, Sonia Pappachan
‘Affluent’ Justice: The Role Of Ses In Sentencing Severity, Sonia Pappachan
Student Theses
Imprisonment is the harshest punishment the law can give a defendant; it has considerable consequences on the incarcerated, during and after. Therefore, the sentencing phase of the criminal proceedings should be fair and balanced. However, the literature and researches that have explored the biases in sentencing found that there is a disparity in sentencing due to the characteristics of both the victim and the defendant. The current study used a sample of 209 online survey participants to explore the effect of the socioeconomic status of the victim and defendant on sentencing length. Participants reviewed a vignette of a criminal offense …
Gender And Terrorism: A Homeland Security Perspective, Diana Rosa Rodriguez-Spahia
Gender And Terrorism: A Homeland Security Perspective, Diana Rosa Rodriguez-Spahia
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
While scholars have been studying the growing trend of female terrorists for several years, their research has not permeated politics or the media to help inform our Homeland Security policies. The findings from this body of research indicate that there is hesitance on behalf of the public (especially politicians and law enforcement) to acknowledge that women can be terrorists due to deeply engrained gender norms and expectations about gender roles. Terrorist groups are exploiting this unwillingness by recruiting more women to perpetrate terrorist acts (Lele, 2014; Bloom, 2011). Against the backdrop of the changes in gender norms and expectations that …
Very Long Engagements: The Persistent Authority Of Bridewealth In A Post-Apartheid South African Community, Michael W. Yarbrough
Very Long Engagements: The Persistent Authority Of Bridewealth In A Post-Apartheid South African Community, Michael W. Yarbrough
Publications and Research
This article examines the persistent authority of the customary practice for forming recognized marriages in many South African communities, centered on bridewealth and called “lobola.” Marriage rates have sharply fallen in South Africa, and many South Africans blame this on the difficulty of completing lobola amid intense economic strife. Using in-depth qualitative research from a village in KwaZulu-Natal, where lobola demands are the country’s highest and marriage rates its lowest, I argue that lobola’s authority survives because lay actors, and especially women, have innovated new repertoires of lobola behavior that allow them to pursue emerging needs and desires for marriage …