RHYTHM

This book analyses the conceptual and concrete relationships between rhythm and law Rhythm is the unfolding of ordered and regulated movement Law operates through the ordering and regulation of movement Adopting a rhythmanalytical perspective which treats natural and social phenomena in terms of their rhythms repetitions motions and movements this book offers an account of how legal institutions and practices can be theorised and explained in terms of rhythm It demonstrates how the category of rhythm has jurisprudential significance from how Plato envisaged the functioning of the city state to the operation of the common law as well as in our relationship to contemporary digital technology In music rhythm orders the movement of sound binding together the motions and vibrations of sound in such a way that is neither pure noise nor pure mechanics In this way rhythm can be deployed as a concept in the analysis of one of the central purposes of legal institutions and practices to order the movements of bodies whether the bodies of citizens in everyday life or of prisoners in rituals of punishment This book engages with the mutual intersections and points of illumination between rhythm and law such as ritual measure order and change This book