Dr Lynsey Black, Department of Law, Maynooth University

Dr Lynsey Black spoke about her forthcoming book, which examines women, murder and punishment in independent Ireland. Focusing in particular on the sentencing and punishment of women charged with murder, the talk investigated the use of religious homes as sites of confinement. Dr Lynsey Black explored the meanings of these religious institutions, institutions such as Magdalen Laundries and Mother and Baby Homes, and the paths by which they came to dominate in the post-independence decades, as well as the role of religious institutions in the criminal justice landscape of twentieth century Ireland.

Dr Lynsey Black is a lecturer in criminology in the Department of Law, Maynooth University. She researches in the areas of gender and punishment, the death penalty, historical criminology, and postcolonial criminology. Her first monograph on women, murder and punishment in post-independence Ireland is forthcoming with Manchester University Press. She is currently working on the Irish Research Council-funded project, 'Living Borders: Cattle Smuggling on the Ireland/Northern Ireland Border' which explores border criminality through the 20th century.