Everyday understandings of the law in working-class America
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2984305 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Sally Engle Merry (0000-0001-5872-9898, Wellesley College, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1986 |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 253-270 |
| Publication date | 1986-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | American Ethnologist (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0094-0496 • E-ISSN: 1548-1425 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1525/ae.1986.13.2.02a00040 |
| OpenAlex | W1978174756 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 45 |
| References cited | 25 |
An ethnographic examination of the way working-class Americans who use courts to manage their family and neighborhood disputes think about and use the law suggests that they share beliefs in legal rights and the legal ordering of society characteristic of American society in general. However, when they encounter the courts they develop a more complex understanding that incorporates the plural legal ideologies found within the courthouse. The process of constructing local as well as dominant ideologies has implications for understanding the role of ideology in the maintenance of social order and for analyzing the hegemonic function of law. [legal anthropology, ideology, dispute processing, social control, theory of the state
Ethnography · Hegemony · Ideology · Plural · Political science · Politics · Social control · Sociology · State (computer science · Anthropology · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Law in Society and Culture
Anthropology, Law, and Transnational Processes
African American Divorce in Virginia and Washington, D.C., 1865-1930
Performing Power in Zimbabwe
Ocupación de tierras y administración estatal de disputas
Halacha , The ‘Jewish State’ and The Canadian Agunah
Playing Off Courts
Justice on the Margin
A transplantabilidade jurídica em matéria de Direitos Humanos
Law as Popular Culture
Compensation Funds, Trials and the Meaning of Claims
Being in Public
Interpretive Sociolegal Research
Boundaries of Legitimacy
Comment?Power Is as Power Does
The Process Is the Punishment
Off to Meet the Wizard
Critical Empiricism” in American Legal Studies
The Intrigues of Rights, Resistance, and Accommodation
Reciprocidad política y maternalismo. Un acercamiento antropológico a un conflicto por demanda habitacional
Immigrant Suburban Settlement and the “Threat” to Middle Class Status and Identity
Cognitive and behavioral distancing from the poor
The Responsibilization Strategy of Health and Safety
Revisiting forum shopping
Legal Discourse and Political Intolerance
Images of Law in Everyday Life
Mobilizing Law in Response to Collective Problems
Bad Attitudes
Inquisitorial Adjudication and Institutional Constraints in Chinese Civil Justice
Realizing the Right to Access in France
Democracy, Courts and the Information Order
Sally Engle Merry
History, Power, Ideology, and Culture
Framing the Choice Between Cash and the Courthouse
Courting Difference
Resistance and the Cultural Power of Law
What is Procedural Justice
Legal Pluralism
Everyday understandings of the law in working-class America
Turn-Taking, Overlap, and the Task at Hand
Illegal Aliens" and "Opportunity
Dead Goats and Broken Betrothals
Reasons and the Acceptance of Authoritative Speech
The trial
Sacred Texts and Dangerous Words
Zimbabweans Are Foolishly Litigious
The Politics of informal justice
Felony justice
Law as Process
The Social Cohesion of Liberal Democracy
Outline of a Theory of Practice
Mending Walls and Building Fences
Toward the Creation of a Complementary, Decentralized System of Criminal Justice
Where the Action Is
Rules and processes, the cultural logic of dispute in an African context
Mapping Difficult Terrain
Critical Legal Studies versus Critical Legal Theory
Studying American Legal Culture
Going to Court
The Social Cohesion of Liberal Democracy
The Ideology of Law
Hermeneutics and world construction in Maranao disputing
Everyday understandings of the law in working-class America
Language, Audience, and the Transformation of Disputes
Looking at Culture, Looking for Rules
Rules in Oracles and Games
Let the Evidence Fit the Crime
Structural Communication and Control Communication
Marx and Political Theory
Theory in Anthropology since the Sixties
| Unique citing works | 45 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,13 |
| Citation span | 1986 - 2024 (39) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 44 |