Laughton Angela (author); Kirk Niergarth (thesis advisor); Mount Royal University (Degree granting institution)
Date issued
2016
Description
The Phillips seduction case, tried in a Lethbridge, Alberta court in 1922, reveals that the extent to which the law of seduction empowered women to pursue justice in cases of sexual assault was limited by the ways in which patriarchal society regulated women’s sexuality. May Phillips was a white, American-immigrant teenager living with her family in the Wrentham sectional house in 1922. She was repeatedly assaulted by John Johnson, the forty-year-old section foreman. In court, both crown and defense characterized Phillips and Johnson in ways that reflect patterns present in other seduction cases. The degree to which May Phillips and John Johnson fit social expectations of, respectively,...
