Dr. Fernanda Pirie

Biography

Fernanda Pirie uses anthropological comparative methods to compare legal practices and texts around the world. She has carried out ethnographic fieldwork at the ends of the Tibetan plateau and is currently conducting historical work on Tibetan legal texts. Her recent book, 'The Rule of Laws: a 4,000-year quest to order the world', traces the rise and fall of the world’s major legal systems and compares examples of historic law-making worldwide. In her monograph, 'The Anthropology of Law', she addresses the nature of law as a social form, analyzing its role within societies. Her approach builds on themes and debates developed through the Oxford Legalism project, which collaborates with scholars from anthropology, history, and other disciplines, and has produced four edited volumes. Fernanda’s current research on Tibetan legal texts is funded by the University’s John Fell Fund, initiating a major program investigating historic Tibetan law from the 7th to the 20th centuries. This AHRC project has established a website containing source material on the nature of Tibetan law and its relationship with Buddhism, and she has worked with historians in the region on the ANR/DFG project to develop a social history of Tibet.

Research Interests

Experience