Book Review by Robin Paul Malloy
The history of law is in many ways the history of change. Throughout history one can observe legal philosophers on a quest for the identity of law—for a unifying theory of law. At times law has been closely identified with religion and religious morality; it has also been understood as the dictates of the sovereign, be it those of a monarch or of a legislature. In the early part of the twentieth century, positivists and legal realists offered competing theories on the nature of law, causing dispute and controversy. Recently, however, as the conception of law as an autonomous system or discipline has waned, the study of law has focused on many alternative views. Each of these views of law has its own interdisciplinary connection, and each is “capable” of unmasking the confusion in the law and revealing the “true” identity of the law. Well known among the growing list of alternative legal conceptions are law and economics, law and literature, law and the social sciences, feminist legal theory, and critical legal studies. To this growing list of alternative legal theories we now add law and semiotics.
In her pathbreaking book The Law as a System of Signs, Dr. Roberta Kevelson sets forth the intellectual foundations for a new and exciting conception of law. While one might read Kevelson's book as offering semiotics as a modern replacement for economics as the “imperial science,” it is unlikely that this book alone will accomplish that task. On the other hand, there is a great deal of validity to Kevelson's observation,
For many it was the discovery of semiotics as a method of analyzing sign systems and communicative interactions that coincided with the realization that one had been doing semiotics for a long time, often under the umbrella of other more traditional disciplines. Although some scholars do not describe their work as being within the frame of semiotic method and theory, they seem to be nevertheless much involved within the semiotic process.
In this brief Review I hope to bring some light to the theory of law and semiotics. This Review, therefore, will discuss the general contours of the semiotic method and the theory of law and semiotics, before discussing law as a system of signs. The Review will then conclude by making suggestions for future work in the area.
About the Author
Robin Paul Malloy. Professor of Law and Economics, College of Law, Syracuse University. Research Fellow of the Center for Semiotic Research in Law, Government, and Economics at Penn State University.
Citation
65 Tul. L. Rev. 211 (1990)