James E K Parker
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780198735809
- eISBN:
- 9780191799778
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735809.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Public International Law, Philosophy of Law
Between September 2006 and December 2008, Simon Bikindi stood trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), accused of inciting genocide with his songs. Bikindi’s trial was ...
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Between September 2006 and December 2008, Simon Bikindi stood trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), accused of inciting genocide with his songs. Bikindi’s trial was unprecedented. Never before had an international court or tribunal been called upon to determine a musician’s culpability for acts of genocide. This book explores how the ICTR went about that difficult task. In doing so, however, it takes a particular interest in questions of sound and listening, which it is argued have been seriously neglected in contemporary legal scholarship. One half of the book is addressed to the Tribunal’s ‘sonic imagination’. How did the Tribunal conceive of Bikindi’s songs for the purposes of judgment? How did it understand the role of radio and other media in their transmission? Why? And with what consequences for Bikindi? The other half of the book is addressed to how such concerns manifested themselves acoustically in court. Bikindi’s was a ‘musical trial’, as one judge observed. Recordings of his songs were played regularly throughout. Witnesses including Bikindi himself frequently sang. Indeed, at his appeals hearing Bikindi even sang his final statement. And all the while, judges, barristers, and witnesses alike spoke into microphones and listened on through headphones. As a result, the Bikindi case offers an ideal opportunity to explore what this book calls the ‘judicial soundscape’. Though addressed to a single case, the book’s most important innovation is to open up the field of sound to jurisprudential inquiry. Ultimately, it is an argument for a specifically acoustic jurisprudence.Less
Between September 2006 and December 2008, Simon Bikindi stood trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), accused of inciting genocide with his songs. Bikindi’s trial was unprecedented. Never before had an international court or tribunal been called upon to determine a musician’s culpability for acts of genocide. This book explores how the ICTR went about that difficult task. In doing so, however, it takes a particular interest in questions of sound and listening, which it is argued have been seriously neglected in contemporary legal scholarship. One half of the book is addressed to the Tribunal’s ‘sonic imagination’. How did the Tribunal conceive of Bikindi’s songs for the purposes of judgment? How did it understand the role of radio and other media in their transmission? Why? And with what consequences for Bikindi? The other half of the book is addressed to how such concerns manifested themselves acoustically in court. Bikindi’s was a ‘musical trial’, as one judge observed. Recordings of his songs were played regularly throughout. Witnesses including Bikindi himself frequently sang. Indeed, at his appeals hearing Bikindi even sang his final statement. And all the while, judges, barristers, and witnesses alike spoke into microphones and listened on through headphones. As a result, the Bikindi case offers an ideal opportunity to explore what this book calls the ‘judicial soundscape’. Though addressed to a single case, the book’s most important innovation is to open up the field of sound to jurisprudential inquiry. Ultimately, it is an argument for a specifically acoustic jurisprudence.
James E K Parker
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780198735809
- eISBN:
- 9780191799778
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735809.003.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Public International Law, Philosophy of Law
This chapter introduces the Bikindi case along with the book’s main argument. It suggests that questions of sound and listening have been seriously neglected in contemporary legal scholarship and ...
More
This chapter introduces the Bikindi case along with the book’s main argument. It suggests that questions of sound and listening have been seriously neglected in contemporary legal scholarship and that there is a need, therefore, for a specifically acoustic jurisprudence. As a community of legal thinkers and practitioners, this chapter suggests, we must teach ourselves to listen to law, to attend properly to questions of sound in the administration of justice. The chapter then explains why the Bikindi case provides such a rich starting point in this respect. All legal thought and practice necessarily takes place in and in relation to sound, but what makes Bikindi’s trial particularly compelling for an acoustic jurisprudence is the extent to which it dramatizes this fact. The chapter ends with an overview of the book’s structure.Less
This chapter introduces the Bikindi case along with the book’s main argument. It suggests that questions of sound and listening have been seriously neglected in contemporary legal scholarship and that there is a need, therefore, for a specifically acoustic jurisprudence. As a community of legal thinkers and practitioners, this chapter suggests, we must teach ourselves to listen to law, to attend properly to questions of sound in the administration of justice. The chapter then explains why the Bikindi case provides such a rich starting point in this respect. All legal thought and practice necessarily takes place in and in relation to sound, but what makes Bikindi’s trial particularly compelling for an acoustic jurisprudence is the extent to which it dramatizes this fact. The chapter ends with an overview of the book’s structure.
