History Lab

When was the last time you were asked to sign something and did you stop to think how the strange squiggly mark you make on a page could be used?

The signature is a performative act, crucial to the law’s way of knowing, but it’s also been used as an instrument of power and control.

In this episode of History Lab we hear from a boy who was stolen, the man who took him away and the Judge who was asked to decide if a mother’s thumbprint was a sign of consent.

The presence or absence of a signature on a legal document can speak volumes and throughout history Aboriginal people have been reclaiming this marker of individual identity to represent the many and speak back to an empire.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this episode contains the voices and names of deceased persons.

‘Making a Fortune’ looks at the popularity and persecution of two of the most formidable fortune tellers of Federation Australia.

In the first decade of the 20th century, Australians were focused on the future. It was the dawn of a new century, and a newly-formed nation. But during this time, police were cracking down on a booming industry dominated by women—it was a service that society deemed superstitious, archaic and fraudulent and one that is unlawful to this day in some parts of Australia. This is a story of entrepreneurship, independence and the force of the law.

Why were these female fortune tellers so aggressively pursued by the police and how did they use the law to fight back?

History Lab host Dr Tamson Pietsch hands over the mic to Dr Alecia Simmonds, an interdisciplinary scholar of law and history at the University of Technology Sydney. In this bonus episode they dissect how it is the law ‘knows’ and discuss how both history and the law rely on traces from the past to draw conclusions in the present. If truth is uncertain in historical archives – is it even harder to find in the courtroom?

Season 3 of History Lab will be taking a short break returning February 4 2020.

Episode two ‘Making a fortune’ is dropping in the new year with Dr Alana Piper from the Australian Centre for Public History.

Death, money and family are the key ingredients in any last will and testament. They also make a killer cocktail that unleashes a special force not present in any other part of the law.

In this episode of History Lab, we’re looking at how the law determines your last wishes through some truly unusual cases. Whether it’s for reasons of urgency, eccentricity or expediency, courts around the world regularly have to make calls on the wishes of the dead. But how does the law know it’s getting it right and what does it mean for those left behind.

History Lab is back for a third season, fresh from wins at the New York Radio Festival Awards and the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia.

In this special four-part series we’ll be exploring the ‘law’s way of knowing’, looking at histories that intersect with the law.

From fortune telling to fingerprints, unusual wills and the forensic theory that something is always left behind, join us as we delve into the traces left by the law.

Episode One drops December 12.

Three days before Spain’s general elections in 2004 a series of bombs exploded on crowded Madrid commuter trains, killing almost 200 people.

The Spanish authorities found a plastic bag a few blocks away from one of the bomb sites with a single, incomplete fingerprint.

This was the trace linked to a man living 9000 kms away, a US Attorney in Oregon by the name of Brandon Mayfield.

We’ve been told that every fingerprint is unique to every finger, but what if this is the wrong question to ask?

Forensic Science was founded on the principle that ‘every contact leaves a trace’ but history shows we can’t always rely on one trace alone.