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In the title of Reza Banakar’s first internationally published book The Doorkeepers of the Law: A Socio-Legal Study of Ethnic Discrimination in Sweden (1998) his interest in Franz Kafka is already obvious. Much later, Banakar (2010) presented his view of Kafka's conception of law in his article In Search of Heimat: A Note on Franz Kafka's Concept of Law, and more recently, Banakar (2015) developed his reading of Kafka’s both existential and legal significance in the chapter A Note on Franz Kafka’s Concept of Law. In his readings of Kafka, it is striking how Banakar emphasizes the uncertainty and unpredictability of human conduct; Kafka’s ”writings highlight the role of uncertainty, insecurity, transience and the unknowable” (Banakar, 2015) in contrast to contemporaneous rationalistic modern theories (of the law). In particular, Banakar highlighted the fact that Kafka, both a practicing lawyer and a fiction writer, thinks “double thoughts”. This duality – living a double life as a lawyer and a writer – makes Kafka a central and natural figure of the Law and Literature Movement, particularly in the Law in Literature part of the movement. This essay will highlight Banakar’s contribution to the Law and Literature Movement as a socio-legal scholar and reader of Franz Kafka, with special focus on his article In Search of Heimat: A Note on Franz Kafka's Concept of Law (2010). In the article, Banakar discusses both the novel The Trial by Franz Kafka (1925) and the parable Before the Law, contained in the same novel, in to the context of Kafka’s legal work as an insurance lawyer. In the essay we attempt to make a connection between the field of Law as Literature and Law and the Literature Movement. We do so by using narratives and literary techniques to give a testimony about a semi-fictional character who finds himself standing before the law. We will also pay attention to the fact that it is now 75 years since The Nuremberg trials took place 1945–1946. The Nuremberg trials

This open access book pays homage to Reza Banakar, who passed away in August 2020, exploring the many different areas of socio-legal research that he worked on and influenced. It begins with a summary of his career and explains how he sparked a debate on the identity and aims of legal sociology. The book is then split into 5 sections: - Theory, including chapters on normativity and the stepchild controversy;- Methods and interdisciplinarity, illustrating how Banakar encouraged socio-legal scholars to push the boundaries of existing socio-legal knowledge through interdisciplinary imagination and methodological flexibility;- Legal culture, with particular focus on Iran - 2 areas of special interest for Banakar;- Law and science, covering topics such as human rights, the right to life, and the COVID-19 pandemic; and- Applied sociology of law, inspired by Banakar's engagement with empirical research and case studies. As well as honouring Reza Banakar's memory and unique thinking, the book aims to advance the sociology of law by demonstrating the interconnectedness of the legal and the social from a broad range of perspectives.