ALWD Scholars’ Forum

On October 9, the Law School hosted an Association of Legal Writing Directors Scholars’ Forum before the Central States Region Conference.  The Forum was an all-day event in which legal writing faculty from across the United States came to discuss their current scholarship in a roundtable format.  After Dean Rofes’ warm welcome, Professor Dan Weddle from UMKC Law School gave an excellent presentation on how to critique scholarship.  The group then broke up into small sections to give the participants a chance to discuss their scholarship and receive feedback.  At the end of the day, a panel of experienced authors gave helpful and practical advice on how to get published. 

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Samuel Johnson’s 300th Birthday

Samuel JohnsonToday is Samuel Johnson’s 300th birthday.

After nine years of work, Samuel Johnson published a major dictionary of English words in 1755.  One of the key features of A Dictionary of the English Language was that Dr. Johnson used quotations from books where a particular word was used to illustrate the word’s meaning.

Why should a law school be interested in Samuel Johnson’s dictionary and his 300th birthday?  On the way to work this morning, I heard a BBC radio program (aired on NPR) about Dr. Johnson’s dictionary.  On that show, the commentators discussed how Dr. Johnson’s dictionary is important to the United States Constitution because it was the dictionary most often used during the time the Constitution was drafted.  Jack Lynch also refers to Dr. Johnson’s influence on documents related to the founding of this country in his 2005 New York Times article.  For further reading on this topic, Henry Hitching’s book, Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary:  The Extraordinary Story of the Book that Defined the World, looks promising.

Does anyone know of examples where legal advocates have cited Dr. Johnson’s dictionary to interpret the law?

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Mastering the Art of Legal Writing

childsWednesday night I went to see the movie Julie & Julia, which is about a writer, Julie, who blogs about working her way through chef Julia Child’s famed cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, in one year.  I loved everything about the movie, and as such, I’m starting off this blog post with a discussion of the movie.  (This post was actually originally entitled “Best Brief Awards.”) 

One of my favorite scenes was when Julie pulled her first roasted whole chicken out of the oven.  I roasted my first whole chicken this summer.  Like Julie, who felt like a “lobster killer” when she boiled three live lobsters for Lobster Thermidor, I must admit that I felt a bit like an executioner when I ordered my organic hand-fed chicken through our CSA, Backyard Bounty.  Guiltily, I asked Farmer Laura how she knows which chickens are ready for slaughter.  She said she knows it’s time when the chickens start to bite her.  (I guess the lesson there is “don’t bite the hand that feeds you.”)  At home with my chicken, I tried to do the chicken justice by dressing it with olive oil and sprigs of thyme and rosemary from our garden.  I felt Julie’s same sense of pride and excitement when I opened the oven door and a perfect golden-brown roast chicken appeared from the oven.

Watching the movie reminded me of how students develop in their legal writing classes. 

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