Tutorial by Dr Jessica Lake (1.11.23)
About
The Slander of Women: Australia and the gendered reform of defamation in the 19thcentury common law worldIn the nineteenth century, a gendered reform movement known as the Slander of Women Acts swept through the common law world, making it easier for women to sue for defamatory allegations of sexual immorality. These reforms, while technical in language, reflected important shifts in understanding about gender, social status and speech and carried significant social and cultural implications. At one level, they enabled individual women to vindicate their reputations, obtain financial compensation and silence vituperative attacks.
What spurred the Australian colonies – NSW, South Australia, and Victoria in particular – to break with England on this issue? How did new significance of respectability, ideas of civilisation, and conditions of commerce influence the direction and development of defamation laws in these far-flung colonies?
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