[DOWNLOAD] "To Catch a Sex Thief: The Burden of Performance in Rape and Sexual Assault Trials." by Columbia Journal of Gender and Law # eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: To Catch a Sex Thief: The Burden of Performance in Rape and Sexual Assault Trials.
- Author : Columbia Journal of Gender and Law
- Release Date : January 22, 2006
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 373 KB
Description
All the world's a stage, And the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; And one [wo]man in [her] time plays many parts. (1) Jacques' observation in Shakespeare's As You Like It describes the typical rape and sexual assault trial in the United States. The complainant (2) plays many different characters throughout the course of the trial. Prewritten cultural scripts dictate her (3) lines. The setting is both the courtroom and the scene of the alleged rape as imagined by the jury. Unique to a rape "play," however, an accuser cannot be sure which role the jury will assign to her by the time it begins its deliberations. Is she to be cast as a whore? (4) A vengeful liar? A tease? Mentally unstable? If she has the "proper" background and the defendant is a stranger, can she play the role of an innocent Madonna whose perceived purity may result in the rarest of events: a guilty verdict?