Earth–outer space interactions challenge conventional legal structures through dynamics that transcend jurisdictional boundaries and temporal scales. International law historically operates through specific spatiotemporal assumptions: geometric space, chronometric time, and cartographic politics. These elements structure how legal authority is conceptualised and enacted. This study recognizes the interconnectedness between Earth and outer space, positioning legal thought and practice within planetary and cosmic contexts. This integrative framework moves beyond anthropocentric and state-centric paradigms to address the indeterminate nature of multifaceted systems. The research employs an interdisciplinary methodology that integrates legal theory and doctrine, systems engineering, and systems science to analyse emergent phenomena such as orbital debris dynamics. The study concludes that addressing Earth–outer space interactions effectively requires not merely integrating existing legal regimes but reconceptualizing core legal concepts to align better with complex, multi-scalar and emergent dynamics.

This article examines the notions of productivity and creativity with respect to complex verbs in English. Verb-forming suffixation involves the attachment of the suffixes ‑ize, ‑ify, -en and -ate to a base to form complex verbs such as hospitalize, densify, sharpen and hyphenate. Sampson (2016) describes productive processes that conform to existing patterns as F-creativity, or Fixed-creativity, and those that deviate from those patterns as E-creativity, or Enlarging/Extending creativity; Bergs (2018) and Uhrig (2018) view the F–E dichotomy as a cline. Coercion effects can account for linguistic productivity and creativity; Audring & Booij (2016) propose that the coercive mechanisms of Selection, Enrichment and Override lie on a unified continuum. This article integrates the F–E creativity and coercion continua, and analyses a database of conventionalized and recently coined complex verbs (Laws 2023) for instances of coercion. The results reveal that coercive mechanisms, particularly Selection and Enrichment, facilitate productivity and creativity in more complex constructional schemas underlying verbal derivatives, and that these coercive patterns have become increasingly more entrenched over time. E-creativity of complex verbs is defined here as ‘Unruly’ coercion and the nature of attested examples is discussed.

Approaches to creativity commonly distinguish between F-creativity (rule-compliant use) and E-creativity (rule-breaking use). This dichotomy in part stems from a focus on grammatical constructions (‘nodes’) at the relative expense of their connections (‘links’). We approach creativity and productivity from a link-based perspective in Usage-Based Construction Grammar, and assume that productivity pertains to a unit’s inventory of links, while creativity pertains to the creation and maintenance of links. These assumptions are showcased using the into-causative (He talked me into going, They scared us into working harder). The construction is productive because it hosts a large inventory of verbal slot-fillers (talk, scare). Conversely, these slot-fillers themselves are creative because they can establish and maintain links with a construction that is not their primary host. This property is not linear: we assume that the slot-fillers’ ability to occur in unusual constructional environments reflects their general ‘creative potential’ to form and maintain (new) links within the network. In data from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), we find weak, but consistent correlations between verbs’ association with the into-causative and (i) their semantic and syntactic compatibility with the construction, and, crucially, (ii) their general flexibility and ability to establish and maintain links.

This article examines land disputes in Epetedo, a Lagos neighbourhood established in 1862, to explore how city dwellers interpreted their past and defined their area’s identity. After its establishment, Epetedo became the centre of conflicts over the ownership of its 21 compounds. From 1927 to 1947, two factions produced competing historical narratives in an effort to change property laws and disseminate their quarter’s history. Drawing on disputants’ records like petitions and letters, I demonstrate how residents articulated the meaning of a neighbourhood through historical writing, as well as through their socio-political and spatial engagements.

In this article, the author examines the influence of Immanuel Kant’s philosophical ideas on Hans Kelsen’s early theory of international law. He situates Kelsen’s work within the post-World War I context, where Kant’s vision of perpetual peace significantly impacted the creation of international organizations. The article delves into Kelsen’s seminal work “Das Problem der Souveränität und die Theorie des Völkerrechts,” exploring how Kelsen’s pure theory of law parallels and diverges from Kant’s concepts. While Kelsen’s ideas were shaped by Kantian philosophy, particularly in promoting a lawful international order, Kelsen transcended Kant by developing a more rigorous, epistemologically grounded legal theory. The author argues that Kelsen’s adaptation of Kantian principles reflects both a continuation and transformation of Kant’s vision, tailored to the political and cultural challenges of early 20th-century Europe.

This article examines the practice of post-mortem examination in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1793–1815). The professional medical logbooks kept by ship’s surgeons as part of their mandated practice reveal that they turned to pathological anatomy to diagnose their patients – a technique typically associated with French anatomy during this period. I show that these post-mortem dissections blended medicine and surgery together by correlating clinical signs and symptoms of disease with pathological manifestations of disease in the bodies after death. This article also considers the medical culture that existed on these ships that enabled this research, specifically how captains, officers and crew responded to, and interpreted, such medical enquiry on board. By resituating the naval ship as a site of medical experimentation and enquiry, I explore how naval surgeons participated in medical research within the Royal Navy and used the ship space to engage in pathological anatomy before their British civilian counterparts flocked to French hospitals after the wars.