Confronting Jurisdiction with Antinomian Bodies

Olivia Barr argued that the common law is carried on the surface of bodies and transferred through encounters, creating, altering and organising ‘lawful relations’. She also argued that the common law is reconstituted through these movements, particularly the place-making activities of burying the dead. However, if the lawful treatment of the dead is cleaved from burial, can the dead still be constitutive of the common law or does this potentiate alternative nomoi? Through a material metaphor of dance, biogram and lawscape, the author explores the potential for different configurations of jurisdiction in events following the 2018 Humboldt Broncos bus crash.