How Can Women's Roles in Colonial Legal Systems Be Uncovered Through a Gendered Approach to Legal History?

Luisa Stella Coutinho

In this video, LUISA STELLA COUTINHO explores how historical narratives have silenced or denied women’s roles in shaping legal systems. Coutinho challenges traditional historical approaches by focusing on the active involvement of women in the creation and influence of law, especially within colonial contexts. Using diverse sources such as court records, religious texts, and missionary reports, she uncovers the silences embedded in archival practices and redefines gendered legal history. Through case studies in colonial Brazil and early modern Japan, Coutinho highlights the diverse experiences of women in shaping social norms, legal categories, and survival strategies, offering a fresh perspective on the intersection of gender, law, and power. This research invites a rethinking of historical legal frameworks and their relevance to contemporary gender issues.

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.21036/LTPUB101185

Researcher

Luisa Stella Coutinho is a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory in Frankfurt, where she has been based since 2018. Her research focuses on women's legal history, gender studies, and the intersection of law and gender in imperial histories. Her current project explores women's legal history in Japan, with a particular emphasis on Christian Japanese women. Coutinho holds a PhD in Law (Legal History) from the Universidade de Lisboa, as well as a Master's degree in the same field. She holds degrees in both Law and Psychology from Brazil and is also a qualified lawyer in both Brazil and Portugal.

Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory

The Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory considers its most important task to consist in engaging in theoretically reflected historical research in the field of law and other forms of normativity in order to make a specific contribution to the fundamental research in legal scholarship, the social sciences and historical humanities. The Institute’s research examines law, its constitution, legitimation, transformation and practice. Particular attention is paid to the positioning of historical forms of ‘law’ in the context of other normative orders. The establishment of a department engaged in developing a multidisciplinary legal theory in 2020 substantially expands the Institute's engagement with issues of legal theory.

Original Publication

Women in the Captaincy of Paraíba: a Legal History Approach to the Sources of Colonial Brazil

Luisa Stella de Oliveira Coutinho Silva

Published in 2021

Making Women Sinners: Guilt and Repentance of Converted Japanese Women in the Application of Alagona's "Compendium Manualis Navarri" in Japan (16th Century)

Luisa Stella de Oliveira Coutinho Silva

Published in 2024