About
Gurnham has published two monographs (Gurnham, D. Memory, Imagination, Justice: Intersections of law and literature, Ashgate 2009; Gurnham, D. Crime, Desire and Law’s Unconscious: Law, Literature, Culture, Routledge 2014), as well as several peer-reviewed articles in international journals and chapter contributions, establishing a strong reputation and track record as a scholar of law, literature and culture and well as in criminal law. Gurnham has been co-Editor-in-Chief of the journal Law and Humanities (Routledge/Taylor & Francis) with Professor Gary Watt (Warwick Law School) since 2017, and co-hosts the annual Law and Humanities summer Roundtable. He has also edited special issues in leading journals in both the UK (Journal of Law and Society, 2016; International Journal of Law in Context, 2022) and the United States (New Criminal Law Review, 2014 -with Imogen Jones). Gurnham is a member of the Advisory Board of the International Journal of Law in Context and more recently the Edinburgh Critical Studies in Law, Literature and the Humanities at the Edinburgh University Press. Gurnham teaches the modules Criminal Law (LLB1) and Crime in Law, Literature and Culture (LLB3) at Southampton Law School, where he was Deputy Head of School (Research) from 2016 to 2019.
Research
Research groups
Research interests
- Gurnham's research and teaching reflect a primary interest in interdisciplinary approaches to law, through humanities and the arts.
Current research
Gurnham's current research focuses on interdisciplinary approaches to criminal law, punishment and marginalisation. Related outputs recently published/in-press and in progress include:
Gurnham, D. 'Walls and Bridges: Framing Lockdown through Metaphors of Imprisonment and Fantasies of Escape', a chapter conribution to Carl Stychin (ed.) Law, Humanities and the COVID Crisis (University of London Press, 2022);
David Gurnham (2022) “Our Country Is a Freedom-Loving Country”: The Spreading Virus as Metaphor for “People on the Move”, Metaphor and Symbol, 37:2, 140-151, DOI: 10.1080/10926488.2021.1954858.
David Gurnham and Haris Psarras, 'Psychoanalysis and Language', an invited contribution to Spoo, B. (ed) 'Elgar Concise Encyclopedia of Law & Literature.
Gurnham’s recent and current collaborative projects include, for example:
Marginalisation in Law, Policy and Society – a guest-edited special issue of the International Journal of Law in Context (vol. 18(1), 2022), including the essay Introduction: Marginalisation in Law, Policy and Society, pp.1-9;
Law and Humanities Roundtable 2022: Time and Temporalities, July 7, 2022, a hybrid research workshop featuring nine paper presentations, hosted from Southampton Law School, co-chaired by Gurnham, with Dr Stephanie Jones (Soton, Dept of English), Prof Gary Watt (Warwick) and Dr Sophie Doherty (Open University);
Legal Masterplots: a way forward for socio-legal studies? – research workshops at Durham and Southampton Law Schools in Autumn-Winter 2022, with Dr Chris Bevan (Durham);
A Law, Humanities and the Arts network, with Dr Haris Psarras (Soton): 'Learning from Marginalised People's Creative Responses to Justice Problems', involving reserach and knowledge exchnage workshops June 2023 (funded by the Southampton Law School Stretegic Research Fund), March 2024 and June 2024 (funded by the Southampont Institute of Arts and Humanities).
Research projects
Active projects
Completed projects
Publications
Pagination
Teaching
Gurnham's teaching interest are in Criminal Law, and Interdisciplinary humanities approaches to crime. He is co-module lead (with Mark Telford), lecturer and tutor for Criminal Law (LAWS1020 and LAWS 2025); also solo module lead, lecturer and tutor for Crime in Law, Literature and Culture (LAWS3098).
External roles and responsibilities
Biography
David Gurnham is a Professor of Criminal Law and Interdisciplinary Legal Studies within Southampton Law School at the University of Southampton. He came to Southampton as a Reader (Associate Professor) in 2012, having previously been a Lecturer in Healthcare Law and Ethics at the University of Manchester (2005 - 2012), and a Lecturer in Law at the University of Reading (2003 – 2005).