Leeds Law School launches new podcast series

Through these podcasts, colleagues from Leeds Beckett will provide a range of insights related to their research, discussing what projects they’re working on, their motivations behind them, benefits and challenges to their research, and next steps for their work.

In this first podcast episode, Dr Louisa Ashley, Head of Subject (Postgraduate) interviews Dr Jill Dickinson, Dr Agata Fijalkowski, Dr Suzzie Oyakhire, and Dr Anne-Marie Greenslade around the publication/forthcoming publication of the following books:

• Professional Development for Practitioners in Academia: Pracademia – Dr Jill Dickinson and Teri-Lisa Griffiths. This multidisciplinary collection:
  
  • brings together the perspectives of 29 contributors from the UK and internationally;
  • centres on the three core themes of Pracademic Identities, Professional Development, and Teaching Practice;
  • provides theoretical, reflective, and empirical insights.
    
    
• Law, Visual Culture, and the Show Trial - Dr Agata Fijalkowski - The book addresses the relationship between law and the visual by examining the relevance of photography in Central, East, and Southeast Europe to show that:
  
  • The dispensation of justice during communist rule in Albania, East Germany, and Poland was reliant on legal propaganda, making the visual a fundamental part of the legitimacy of the law. The select photographs of trials demonstrate how this message was conveyed to audiences watching and participating in the spectacle of show trials.
  • Legal actors and political authorities embraced new photographic technologies to advance their legal propaganda and legal photography.
  • This research challenges straightforward accounts of the relationship between law and the visual, critically engaging entrenched legal historical narratives, in relation to three different protagonists, to offer the possibility of reclaiming and rewriting past accounts.
  • The power of images can also be subversive; and, as such, the cases it addresses contribute to the discourse on visual epistemology and open onto contemporary questions about law and its inherent performativity.
    
    
• Witness Protection and Criminal Justice in Africa: Nigeria in International Perspective - Dr Suzzie Oyakhire - This book explores the concept of witness protection which is still at an early developmental stage in several jurisdictions including Nigeria. The book acknowledges that the concept of witness protection is an area of enquiry lacking conceptual clarification. Recent developments in Nigeria prompted the need to clarify legal and conceptual issues within the existing legal framework for protecting witnesses. Using the Nigerian case study, the book illuminates the obscurities inherent in the concept of witness protection highlighted around five critical areas:
  
  • the definition of witness protection;
  • the scope of beneficiaries requiring protection;
  • the nature of crimes necessitating protection;
  • the nature of protective measures;
  • and the administrative control of witness protection.
    
    
• Modern Slavery Survivor Pathways: Policy, Legislation and Practice in the UK - Dr Anne-Marie Greenslade:
  
  • Provides a holistic picture of survivor support services for victims and survivors of modern slavery and human trafficking in the UK;
  • Uses analysis from interviews with frontline practitioners to identify areas of good practice in frontline support;
  • Makes recommendations for improvements in law and policy.

The new podcast series was officially launched this week at the Law School’s Teaching and Research Celebration Event on Wednesday 6 December, where colleagues and students from across the School came together to showcase and celebrate a range of collaborative initiatives, including the Law Clinic, our exclusive partnership with Support Through Court, our innovative immersive learning programme and career mentoring programme. As part of the event, postgraduate students also took part in a Three Minute Thesis and Poster Competition, which will be judged by a panel of colleagues from across the University.