Socio-Legal Discussion Group: Who is the mentally disordered offender? A critical discourse analysis of Hong Kong Reasons for Sentence judgments.
Notes & Changes
The CSLS discussion group is organized by students, with each session focused on a different research topic, presented by internal or external speakers.
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Abstract
Who is the mentally disordered offender? In this presentation, I discuss how I have come to formulate and answer the research questions in my DPhil thesis, a socio-legal interrogation of judicial constructions of the mentally disordered offender in criminal sentencing. The thesis is informed by a critical discourse analysis of 300 recently published 'Reasons for Sentence' judgments from Hong Kong, drawing on Foucauldian theories of power and knowledge as well as critical studies of dis/ability and the self. I highlight, firstly, the value of adopting a qualitative and discursive approach to examining what are archetypally 'legal' texts and, secondly, original findings on the interplay between law and disciplinary power in constructing mental disorder and the criminal subject in sentencing.