Slave Cases and Ingrained Racism in Legal Information Infrastructures
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2-6-2024
Abstract
Prof. Chapman will present her recent work, Slave Cases and Ingrained Racism in Legal Information Infrastructures. The long shadow of slavery persists in legal citations and is embedded in the information systems informing the legal profession. The information infrastructures that categorize case law and inform legal research ingrain racism in the American legal system by perpetuating and masking case law connections to slavery and enslaved persons. Chapman’s work builds on recent criticism of the continued citation to cases rooted in the institution of slavery and addresses how legal information infrastructures contribute to the problem, and could institute change.
Jennifer Chapman is the research and faculty services librarian at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law, Thurgood Marshall Law Library. Her scholarship has appeared in the Journal of International and Comparative Law, Fordham Law Review, Denver Law Review, and in the library and information science texts, Antiracist Library and Information Science: Racial Justice and Community and The Role of Citation in the Law.
https://www.law.upenn.edu/calendar/event/69052-biddle-speaker-series-jennifer-chapman-presents
Keywords
Library, Information Science, Law, Slavery, Information Infrastructure, Legal Information
Publication Title
Antiracist Library and Information Science: Racial Justice and Community
Repository Citation
Chapman, Jennifer E., "Slave Cases and Ingrained Racism in Legal Information Infrastructures" (2024). Biddle Speaker Series. 5.
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/bll_speakerseries/5