Zombie Law Conjugality Annulment and the Marri

Authors: Heather Brook

Publish Date: 2013/11/09

Volume: 22, Issue: 1, Pages: 49-66

PDF Link

Abstract

This article deploys and extends Ulrich Beck’s critique of ‘zombie categories’ Beck in J Consum Cult 1 2261–277 2001 to consider how conjugal relationships are brought into being before the law The argument presented here is that sexual performatives relating to marriage—and especially in this instance consummation—continue to produce a kind of sociallegal magic even as the social flesh of their enactment is rotting Rules concerning annulment relating to wedding ceremonies consent disclosure and consummation demonstrate that certain frameworks of conjugality involve a kind of corporeal magic animating the privileged place of heterosexual marriage Thus rules and regulations pertaining to weddings continue to produce and protect heterogendered sexually dimorphous bodies even though this privileging is—or at least is becoming—socially obsolete

Keywords: