Cynthia Herrup

{{short description|American historian}}

Cynthia Herrup is an American historian of early modern British law who holds the position of Professor of History and Law at the University of Southern California.{{cite web |url=http://college.usc.edu/cf/faculty-and-staff/faculty.cfm?pid=1008256&CFID=10501135&CFTOKEN=32877231 |title=Faculty Profile > USC College of Letters, Arts & Sciences |publisher=college.usc.edu |accessdate=2010-01-22 }}

Herrup's writings center primarily on the social history of criminal law, but she also touches upon the historical impact of gender and sexuality. Her first book, The Common Peace: Participation and the Criminal Law in Seventeenth-Century England, examined how communities without lawyers made decisions about law enforcement—it postulated that people as well as lawyers were important in the history of law. Her second book, A House in Gross Disorder: Sex, Law, and the 2nd Earl of Castlehaven (1999), used a notorious trial to explore how law reflected tensions between genders and generations.

She has held many fellowships, including those from the Folger Shakespeare Library,{{cite web |url=http://www.folger.edu/Content/Collection/Research-Fellowships/Books-by-Long-term-Fellows-at-the-Folger.cfm |title=Books by Long-term Fellows at the Folger-Folger Shakespeare Library |accessdate=2010-02-03 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20100527124758/http://www.folger.edu/Content/Collection/Research-Fellowships/Books-by-Long-term-Fellows-at-the-Folger.cfm |archivedate=2010-05-27 }} the National Humanities Center, and the Huntington Library.{{Cite web |url=http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/history/people/faculty/faculty1008256.html |title=Faculty / USC History |access-date=2010-02-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100226100150/http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/history/people/faculty/faculty1008256.html |archive-date=2010-02-26 |url-status=dead }}