Privacy and Surveillance Law
Overview
This unit introduces students to various social and cultural understandings of ‘privacy’ and how they are articulated into ‘privacy law’. The goal is to give students a theoretically sophisticated understanding of the different social and legal understandings of privacy; the values that privacy law protects, the historical evolution of different privacy protecting legal actions; the way gender, race, sex and class influence experiences and meanings of ‘privacy’; and privacy’s increasingly complex relationship with media, technology and surveillance. The evolution of privacy law is also considered.
Requisites
26-May-2024
26-May-2024
Learning outcomes
Students who successfully complete this unit will be able to:
- Analyse and evaluate contemporary debates over the role and nature of privacy law
- Examine privacy law’s relationship to government and commercial entities
- Discuss the development and evolution of privacy law in its historical and social context
- Conduct effective legal research of both primary and secondary legal materials, as well as relevant interdisciplinary materials
Teaching methods
Hawthorn
| Type | Hours per week | Number of weeks | Total (number of hours) |
|---|---|---|---|
| On-campus Class | 3.00 | 12 weeks | 36 |
| Online Lecture | 1.00 | 12 weeks | 12 |
| Unspecified Activities Independent Learning | 8.50 | 12 weeks | 102 |
| TOTAL | 150 |
Assessment
| Type | Task | Weighting | ULO's |
|---|---|---|---|
| Presentation | Individual | 20 - 40% | 2,3,4 |
| Research Essay | Individual | 60 - 80% | 1,2,4 |
| Presentation | Individual | 20 - 40% | 2,3,4 |
| Research Essay | Individual | 60 - 80% | 1,2,4 |
| Presentation | Individual | 20 - 40% | 2,3,4 |
| Research Essay | Individual | 60 - 80% | 1,2,4 |
Content
- The purpose of privacy protection
- Privacy and technology
- The history and evolution of various privacy ideas and actions
- The subject of privacy (gender, race, sex, class)
- Privacy and institutional/social media
- Data, profiling & identifiability
- Privacy and countervailing/competing interests
- Research skills
Study resources
Reading materials
A list of reading materials and/or required textbooks will be available in the Unit Outline on Canvas.