Brenda Cossman
Biographic Data
| ID | 324125 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Brenda Cossman |
| GIVEN NAMES | Brenda |
| FAMILY NAME | Cossman |
| SIGNATURE | COSSMAN B |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Toronto |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 35 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1990 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Professor Alan Mewett on morality and the criminal law
Alan Mewett was one of Canada’s most distinguished legal scholars in the fields of criminal law and evidence. His iconic status extended beyond academia, influencing judicial reasoning, legal education, and public policy in Canada. He quite literally wrote the book on criminal law, co-authoring the first Canadian criminal law textbook, shaping the foundation for modern Canadian legal thought. Much could be written about Mewett’s lasting contribut…
Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism
What work does “work” do in sex work? Or, for Heather Berg's book Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism, the question is more specifically, What work does work do in porn work? For Berg, “every porn scene is a record of people at work” (1). But calling it work is only the beginning of the story. Berg's “porn work lens” reminds readers that work is itself a site of struggle, exploitation, creativity, and negotiation. Berg shows us that porn w…
When Queer Theory Goes to Law School
Queer theory developed as an interrogation of the multiple discursive productions of sexuality, seeking to denaturalize the assumed connections between sex, gender, and desire. It did so in part as a break from the prevailing analytic frameworks for theorizing around sexuality. This chapter outlines the emergence of queer theory and some of its distinctive themes and critical sensibilities, highlighting its shared genealogies with feminism as wel…
Fifty Years Later: The Legacy of the 1969 Criminal Law Reforms
Fifty Years Later: The Legacy of the 1969 Criminal Law Reforms." University of Toronto Law Journal, 70(3), pp. 223–224
The 1969 Criminal Amendments: Constituting the Terms of Gay Resistance
This article explores the impact of the 1969 Criminal Code amendments partially decriminalizing homosexuality on the subsequent development of the gay legal subject and gay legal resistance. It argues that the language of privacy constituted the very terms of the resistance to the continued criminalization of many dimensions of gay sexuality
Same-sex marriage beyond Charter dialogue: Charter cases and contestation within government
In this article, I argue that the dialogue debate has obscured a much richer story that can be told about Halpern v Canada, same-sex marriage, and the complex relationship between courts and legislatures. The federal government was deeply divided on same-sex marriage. Parliament, the Liberal government, the federal Cabinet, and the liberal caucus were all deeply divided. From the outside, it may have appeared as a ‘courts versus government’ battl…
Reflections of a Queer Fish
This is an accepted manuscript of an article published by Sage
Gender identity, gender pronouns, and freedom of expression: Bill C-16 and the traction of specious legal claims
Bill C-16, An Act to Amend the Canadian Human Rights Code and the Criminal Code was a government bill intended to provide equal protection of the law to trans and gender non-binary Canadians. It protects individuals from discrimination within the sphere of federal jurisdiction, as well as protecting against hate propaganda and hate crimes, on the basis of gender identity and gender expression. The opposition to previous legislative attempts to pr…
Subversive Sites 20 Years Later: Rethinking Feminist Engagements with Law
In this article, we revisit our co-authored book, Subversive Sites. We explore both what we might have done differently with explicit attention to postcolonial theory, queer theory and neoliberal critiques and what part of the analysis still has traction. We then consider three legal interventions related to violence against women: sexual harassment, domestic violence and rape. We ask two questions: (1) What would the theoretical analysis from Su…
Anxiety Governance
This article explores the role of anxiety in neoliberal regimes of self-governance, arguing that anxiety has become a technique of governance. Discourses of anxiety produce anxious subjects who undertake a range of self-governing projects to manage and mitigate the experience. I explore anxiety governance in the environmental context of “eco-anxiety,” motherhood, and the controversy over Bisphenol A in baby bottles. Maternal toxic vigilance, in w…
Gender Equality: Dimensions of Women's Equal Citizenship
Sexual Citizens: The Legal and Cultural Regulation of Sex and Belonging
"This book explores the relationship between sex and belonging in law and popular culture. Former sexual outlaws have challenged their exclusion and are being incorporated into citizenship, but as citizenship becomes more sexed, it also becomes more privatized and self-disciplined. Brenda Cossman explores these contesting representations of sex and belonging in film, television, and legal decisions. She examines a broad range of subjects, from ga…
Introduction: Privatization, Law, and the Challenge to Feminism
Privatization, Law, and the Challenge to Feminism
Examining eight case studies on the role of law in various arenas, this collection of essays addresses the reconfiguration of the relations between the state, the market, and the family caused by privatization.
Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
The legacy of the first twenty years of the Charter for lesbians and gay men is a contradictory one of victories and defeats. At the level of doctrine, strategy, and politics, both the victories and defeats have been precarious and contradictory. While gaining formal equality rights, lesbians and gay men have not been able to secure rights to sexual freedom. And while formal equality has displaced the heteronormativity that denied legal recogniti…
Sexing Citizenship, Privatizing Sex
This paper explores different stories of sexual citizenship found in gay and lesbian rights struggles. It uses two recent cultural productions, Kissing Jessica Stein and Queer as Folk , to analyze the stories of sexual citizenship found in two Supreme Court decisions, M. v. H. , and Little Sisters. The paper deploys these contrasting stories of sexual citizenship, of sameness and difference, assimilation and subversion, to animate a complex readi…
Whose India? The Independence Struggle in British and Indian Fiction and History . Teresa Hubel Women in Modern India . Geraldine Forbes
Feminist Fashion or Morality in Drag? The Sexual Subtext of the Butler Decision
Bad Attitude/s on Trial: Pornography, Feminism, and the Butler Decision
Mainstream, or straight, pornography still flourishes, while those centering on gay and lesbian sex and s/m sex, are the focus of censorship. A critical analysis of pornography after the Supreme Court?s Butler (1992) decision.
Family inside/out
Trespass, impasse, collaboration: Doing research on women's rights in India
A Matter of Difference: Domestic Contracts and Gender Equality
This essay explores the feminist debates around gender difference and gender equality in the context of the Supreme Court of Canada's Pelech trilogy. It argues that the Court's approach to the enforcement of separation agreements does not adequately account for gender difference. Based on feminist critiques of difference, the essay then suggests an approach which might allow us to move beyond the dilemmas that difference presents to feminist lega…
Sexing Citizenship, Privatizing Sex
This paper explores different stories of sexual citizenship found in gay and lesbian rights struggles. It uses two recent cultural productions, Kissing Jessica Stein and Queer as Folk , to analyze the stories of sexual citizenship found in two Supreme Court decisions, M. v. H. , and Little Sisters. The paper deploys these contrasting stories of sexual citizenship, of sameness and difference, assimilation and subversion, to animate a complex readi…
Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
The legacy of the first twenty years of the Charter for lesbians and gay men is a contradictory one of victories and defeats. At the level of doctrine, strategy, and politics, both the victories and defeats have been precarious and contradictory. While gaining formal equality rights, lesbians and gay men have not been able to secure rights to sexual freedom. And while formal equality has displaced the heteronormativity that denied legal recogniti…
Anxiety Governance
This article explores the role of anxiety in neoliberal regimes of self-governance, arguing that anxiety has become a technique of governance. Discourses of anxiety produce anxious subjects who undertake a range of self-governing projects to manage and mitigate the experience. I explore anxiety governance in the environmental context of “eco-anxiety,” motherhood, and the controversy over Bisphenol A in baby bottles. Maternal toxic vigilance, in w…
A Matter of Difference: Domestic Contracts and Gender Equality
This essay explores the feminist debates around gender difference and gender equality in the context of the Supreme Court of Canada's Pelech trilogy. It argues that the Court's approach to the enforcement of separation agreements does not adequately account for gender difference. Based on feminist critiques of difference, the essay then suggests an approach which might allow us to move beyond the dilemmas that difference presents to feminist lega…
The 1969 Criminal Amendments: Constituting the Terms of Gay Resistance
This article explores the impact of the 1969 Criminal Code amendments partially decriminalizing homosexuality on the subsequent development of the gay legal subject and gay legal resistance. It argues that the language of privacy constituted the very terms of the resistance to the continued criminalization of many dimensions of gay sexuality
Same-sex marriage beyond Charter dialogue: Charter cases and contestation within government
In this article, I argue that the dialogue debate has obscured a much richer story that can be told about Halpern v Canada, same-sex marriage, and the complex relationship between courts and legislatures. The federal government was deeply divided on same-sex marriage. Parliament, the Liberal government, the federal Cabinet, and the liberal caucus were all deeply divided. From the outside, it may have appeared as a ‘courts versus government’ battl…
Gender identity, gender pronouns, and freedom of expression: Bill C-16 and the traction of specious legal claims
Bill C-16, An Act to Amend the Canadian Human Rights Code and the Criminal Code was a government bill intended to provide equal protection of the law to trans and gender non-binary Canadians. It protects individuals from discrimination within the sphere of federal jurisdiction, as well as protecting against hate propaganda and hate crimes, on the basis of gender identity and gender expression. The opposition to previous legislative attempts to pr…
Subversive Sites 20 Years Later: Rethinking Feminist Engagements with Law
In this article, we revisit our co-authored book, Subversive Sites. We explore both what we might have done differently with explicit attention to postcolonial theory, queer theory and neoliberal critiques and what part of the analysis still has traction. We then consider three legal interventions related to violence against women: sexual harassment, domestic violence and rape. We ask two questions: (1) What would the theoretical analysis from Su…
A Matter of Difference: Domestic Contracts and Gender Equality
This essay explores the feminist debates around gender difference and gender equality in the context of the Supreme Court of Canada's Pelech trilogy. It argues that the Court's approach to the enforcement of separation agreements does not adequately account for gender difference. Based on feminist critiques of difference, the essay then suggests an approach which might allow us to move beyond the dilemmas that difference presents to feminist lega…
Trespass, impasse, collaboration: Doing research on women's rights in India
Family inside/out
Feminist Fashion or Morality in Drag? The Sexual Subtext of the Butler Decision
Bad Attitude/s on Trial: Pornography, Feminism, and the Butler Decision
Mainstream, or straight, pornography still flourishes, while those centering on gay and lesbian sex and s/m sex, are the focus of censorship. A critical analysis of pornography after the Supreme Court?s Butler (1992) decision.
Whose India? The Independence Struggle in British and Indian Fiction and History . Teresa Hubel Women in Modern India . Geraldine Forbes
Introduction: Privatization, Law, and the Challenge to Feminism
Privatization, Law, and the Challenge to Feminism
Examining eight case studies on the role of law in various arenas, this collection of essays addresses the reconfiguration of the relations between the state, the market, and the family caused by privatization.
Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
The legacy of the first twenty years of the Charter for lesbians and gay men is a contradictory one of victories and defeats. At the level of doctrine, strategy, and politics, both the victories and defeats have been precarious and contradictory. While gaining formal equality rights, lesbians and gay men have not been able to secure rights to sexual freedom. And while formal equality has displaced the heteronormativity that denied legal recogniti…
Sexing Citizenship, Privatizing Sex
This paper explores different stories of sexual citizenship found in gay and lesbian rights struggles. It uses two recent cultural productions, Kissing Jessica Stein and Queer as Folk , to analyze the stories of sexual citizenship found in two Supreme Court decisions, M. v. H. , and Little Sisters. The paper deploys these contrasting stories of sexual citizenship, of sameness and difference, assimilation and subversion, to animate a complex readi…
Sexual Citizens: The Legal and Cultural Regulation of Sex and Belonging
"This book explores the relationship between sex and belonging in law and popular culture. Former sexual outlaws have challenged their exclusion and are being incorporated into citizenship, but as citizenship becomes more sexed, it also becomes more privatized and self-disciplined. Brenda Cossman explores these contesting representations of sex and belonging in film, television, and legal decisions. She examines a broad range of subjects, from ga…
Gender Equality: Dimensions of Women's Equal Citizenship
Anxiety Governance
This article explores the role of anxiety in neoliberal regimes of self-governance, arguing that anxiety has become a technique of governance. Discourses of anxiety produce anxious subjects who undertake a range of self-governing projects to manage and mitigate the experience. I explore anxiety governance in the environmental context of “eco-anxiety,” motherhood, and the controversy over Bisphenol A in baby bottles. Maternal toxic vigilance, in w…
Gender identity, gender pronouns, and freedom of expression: Bill C-16 and the traction of specious legal claims
Bill C-16, An Act to Amend the Canadian Human Rights Code and the Criminal Code was a government bill intended to provide equal protection of the law to trans and gender non-binary Canadians. It protects individuals from discrimination within the sphere of federal jurisdiction, as well as protecting against hate propaganda and hate crimes, on the basis of gender identity and gender expression. The opposition to previous legislative attempts to pr…
Subversive Sites 20 Years Later: Rethinking Feminist Engagements with Law
In this article, we revisit our co-authored book, Subversive Sites. We explore both what we might have done differently with explicit attention to postcolonial theory, queer theory and neoliberal critiques and what part of the analysis still has traction. We then consider three legal interventions related to violence against women: sexual harassment, domestic violence and rape. We ask two questions: (1) What would the theoretical analysis from Su…
Same-sex marriage beyond Charter dialogue: Charter cases and contestation within government
In this article, I argue that the dialogue debate has obscured a much richer story that can be told about Halpern v Canada, same-sex marriage, and the complex relationship between courts and legislatures. The federal government was deeply divided on same-sex marriage. Parliament, the Liberal government, the federal Cabinet, and the liberal caucus were all deeply divided. From the outside, it may have appeared as a ‘courts versus government’ battl…
Reflections of a Queer Fish
This is an accepted manuscript of an article published by Sage
Fifty Years Later: The Legacy of the 1969 Criminal Law Reforms
Fifty Years Later: The Legacy of the 1969 Criminal Law Reforms." University of Toronto Law Journal, 70(3), pp. 223–224
The 1969 Criminal Amendments: Constituting the Terms of Gay Resistance
This article explores the impact of the 1969 Criminal Code amendments partially decriminalizing homosexuality on the subsequent development of the gay legal subject and gay legal resistance. It argues that the language of privacy constituted the very terms of the resistance to the continued criminalization of many dimensions of gay sexuality
When Queer Theory Goes to Law School
Queer theory developed as an interrogation of the multiple discursive productions of sexuality, seeking to denaturalize the assumed connections between sex, gender, and desire. It did so in part as a break from the prevailing analytic frameworks for theorizing around sexuality. This chapter outlines the emergence of queer theory and some of its distinctive themes and critical sensibilities, highlighting its shared genealogies with feminism as wel…
Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism
What work does “work” do in sex work? Or, for Heather Berg's book Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism, the question is more specifically, What work does work do in porn work? For Berg, “every porn scene is a record of people at work” (1). But calling it work is only the beginning of the story. Berg's “porn work lens” reminds readers that work is itself a site of struggle, exploitation, creativity, and negotiation. Berg shows us that porn w…
Professor Alan Mewett on morality and the criminal law
Alan Mewett was one of Canada’s most distinguished legal scholars in the fields of criminal law and evidence. His iconic status extended beyond academia, influencing judicial reasoning, legal education, and public policy in Canada. He quite literally wrote the book on criminal law, co-authoring the first Canadian criminal law textbook, shaping the foundation for modern Canadian legal thought. Much could be written about Mewett’s lasting contribut…
Sociology (17 works) · Political science (16 works) · Law (15 works) · Gender Studies (10 works) · Feminism (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Politics (8 works) · Feminism, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (5 works) · Queer (5 works) · Homosexuality (4 works)