Courses for Spring 2010
THE FOLLOWING IS NOT A FINAL SCHEDULE. KEEP CHECKING BACK UNTIL THIS ANNOYING MESSAGE IS GONE.
Click here for a schedule with dates and times.
250 – Introduction to Legal Studies (SBD)
Holmes, 108 Gordon Hall; Yoon, 115 Gordon Hall
Lecture, discussion. Interdisciplinary exploration of basic issues of law’s relationship to contemporary society, in which law affects almost all human activity. Topics include the nature as well as historical and social functions of law; the culture and role of major actors in the legal system (lawyers, judges, juries, police, technology); tension between ideals and realities in law; role of law in addressing contemporary social problems. This general education course, based on the assumption that “law is too important to be left to lawyers,” is intended to foster analytical and critical skills and to discuss broad, interdisciplinary questions of individual responsibility, social morality, and justice. Limited to Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors. Seniors will be given enrollment access after sophomores have been ramped on Spire in April.
Syllabus.
297 LL- Law, Literature, and History: The American Experience
Abigail Dallman
How do writers grapple with legal questions? How does the law respond to issues raised in the realm of cultural or popular expression? Taking an interdisciplinary approach, this survey course will examine the legal history of the mid-nineteenth to early twentieth centuries against a larger historical frame which includes literature, film, journalism, and other forms of cultural expression. The turn of the last century was a period of tremendous change in the United States: we entered an age of imperialism, the nation experienced tremendous industrial growth, technological advances required new laws and understandings of privacy and property, and the nation grappled with the meanings of citizenship in the face of immigration, post-bellum emancipation, and the agitation of women for the vote. Significantly, many precedents set during this time of change and development still resonate in our culture today. Using the critical viewpoint that historical analysis facilitates, we will examine an array of different topics and wonder about the role of legislation in the creation of culture and society, and simultaneously, the role of culture and society in the creation of legislation.
297W - World Legal Traditions
Tim Deluane
This course examines legal traditions of the world in comparative perspective, both historically and in contemporary practice. Through engagement with the practices and central tenets of such traditions as cthonic law, civil law (the law of continental European states), common law (the law of England and the US), Islamic law, international law, and European Community law, together with their interactions, we will explore such themes as the meaning of law (as distinct from norms or politics), the dependence on or independence of law from other forms of practice (including religion and social discourse), and the political roles law constructs for its interpreters (with emphasis on the relative accessibility of law and its interpretations to citizens of political communities). The course will be taught in lecture format, but with considerable emphasis on in-class discussion. Regular discussion participation is mandatory.
391C – No Place to Hide: Law & Politics of Information/Data
Gaitenby, 106 Gordon Hall
Surveillance, databases, privacy, and the production of data images are the backdrop for this course. The social and political implications of various data images, and the law’s role in structuring the terrain and the ways in which data images can be manipulated and acted upon, is the focus. Potential topics include: Data images and identity; Data matching and mining in the construction of those images; Demographic / profiling industry and how it relates to marketing, public policy, and policing - security; National ID’s; Workplace bio-metric and background checks; Private and state surveillance.
391U — Due Process in the Criminal Trial
Carhart, 102 Gordon Hall
The course will focus on the impact of the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments in criminal trials. The course will study the historical perspective, the current application and the likely future applications of the amendments. A fundamental understanding of the criminal trial process is required.
397BB – Islam & Justice
Hussin, Gordon Hall
This is a course for students interested in issues of law and legal reform, politics and society, as they intersect with Islam and Muslim societies. We will take an interdisciplinary approach to questions such as: how do law, society and Islam interact in Muslim majority and minority countries? How do social and political actors engage religion and the state, and how does the state engage Muslim communities? Students will use a variety of materials – film, Web, media, literature, law and scholarship – to undertake independent comparative research across issues – religious freedom, legal reform, colonialism, access to justice – and across cases – in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the Americas.
397 CC - Organized Labor and Liberal Democracy
Wolfe, 114 Gordon Hall
Liberal democracy, like all systems of thought and action, carries some tensions and contradictions within itself. This course focuses on one of these areas in particular: the tension between the rights of individual and the rights of the group. We will examine this set of contradictions within liberal democratic thought by studying labor unions, which occupy a unique position in our society. On the one hand, unions have often been accused of being communist front organizations (seeking to impose the “good” of the group over that of any individual), while on the other hand they are also often accused of being houses of corruption and havens for organized crime (going above and around the law to benefit only themselves). Despite this twin set of accusations, unions are also given special rights and privileges under the law of the United States. In this course, we will examine the ways in which the legal, social, and theoretical history of labor unions can help us to understand the ways in which this tension between the individual and the group plays out in liberal democracy.
397G - ST - Law, Crime, and Society
Siulc, 109 Gordon Hall
This course presents cross-cultural definitions of crime and criminality, and explores the intersections of law, public policy and policing, individual and societal norms and notions of justice, and the ways in which different justice systems measure and regulate crime. The course will also examine how ideas about race, gender, and citizenship status factor into constructions of criminality. Case studies will illustrate the formal and informal policing of crime and acts that shock the public conscience, the processes through which certain acts come to be codified as criminal, and the ways in which media and policy debates contribute to legal and social definitions of criminality.
397I — ST - Alternate Dispute Resolution
Wing, 116 Gordon Hall
This course explores the historical origins of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) in immigrant, religious, and indigenous communities in the U.S. Why have advocates in the legal, commercial, labor, educational, and community sectors promoted its use? What has their impact been on the various forms of ADR? Whose interests are served by ADR? A critical analysis of mediation, arbitration, and negotiation in comparison to the judicial system includes attention to how issues of power imbalances and identity impact ADR. We will also briefly explore international dispute resolution and consider its similarities and differences to ADR in this country.
Legal 397DD, Pornography, Gender & the State:
St. Germain, Gordon Hall
This course analyzes one type of mass communication that tells stories about what sex is, can, and should be. It examines the production, text, and consumption of pornography in a social, legal, and political context. For the purposes of this course, I define pornography as material sold in stores, presented as movies or videos, and offered by telephone or over the Internet for the purpose of producing sexual arousal for mostly male customers. The course treats pornography as struggle for control of how issues are framed and how terms are defined in law. It includes an overview of the legal, social and political history of the anti-pornography movement; examines opposing feminist analyses of contemporary pornography; and studies the legal, social and political effects of the use of pornography in society.
397P – Legal Fictions: Makin’ It and Fakin’ It
Gaitenby, 106 Gordon Hall
Law assumes facts, creates entities, and conceals aspects of its operation in order to extend or limit the power of courts in deciding cases. Law creates and deploys fictions (e.g. ‘corporate persons,’ ‘reasonable persons,’ ‘equal protection,’ ‘compelling interests’) in that endeavor. This social construction of law and legal phenomena may be construed as proper or improper depending upon the power of competing stories and story tellers, as well as how we the audience “receives” and “give life” to them. Critical examination of some operational fictions, or scripts of law, as they are constituted in courts and social life more generally is the backbone of this course
450 - Legal Research and Writing
Holmes, 108 Gordon Hall; Wolfe, 114 Gordon Hall
This course is designed to help students improve their ability to analyze and write about complicated legal issues. You should expect to do a lot of writing in this course and participate in peer review of writing assignments. You will learn how to read and understand cases, find your way around a law library, and locate cases and other legal documents using Westlaw and Lexis. Writing assignments include your own résumé and a cover letter, student case briefs, and a thesis-driven research paper, including paper topic/thesis statement, annotated bibliography, and rough draft. Course goals include working through any anxiety about writing, learning how to think and write critically, learning how to find legal materials, reviewing basic rules of grammar, and learning how to format documents including a formal research paper. Satisfactory completion of this course fulfills your junior year writing requirement for the Legal Studies Department.
491C – Law and Conscience
Arons, 120 Gordon Hall
Small seminar requiring substantial participation and regular writing. Uses major literary, historical and cinematic works to explore tension between conscience and law. Works include: A Man for All Seasons (Bolt), An Enemy of the People (Ibsen/Miller), The Stranger (Camus), Sophie’s Choice, Emma (Zinn), King: Montgomery to Memphis , The Front, Rights on Trial (Kinoy), Amistad, Blind Ambition (John Dean), Galileo (Brecht) and Long Goodbye (Colby). Senior and Junior Legal Studies Majors only.
491J - S-Integrative Senior Studies
Arons, 120 Gordon Hall
491S — Law and the World Wide Web
Katsh, 107 Gordon Hall
Recent controversies about downloading music files represent only one of many novel questions the Internet and the World Wide Web are causing the law to grapple with. In this course, we will explore a broad range of topics in this fast-moving area. We will begin with discussion of issues related to constitutional law concerning the First Amendment (e.g., free speech, pornography and obscenity) and the Fourth Amendment (e.g., warrantless search and seizure), areas recently affected by the enactment of the Patriot Act. . Next, we will sample some of the on-going controversies in the area of intellectual property law, including the problem of applying traditional copyright and patent law to software. We will also explore the current debate on cryptography, online gambling, internet taxes, as well as new problems raised by the spread of wireless technologies. Finally, we will consider several issues that touch on ecommerce and online dispute resolution. Each topic will involve reading of primary sources, such as judicial opinions, as well as commentaries on them, such as articles from the computer science, legal, and popular media.
491W – Muslim Women & the Law
Hussin, Gordon Hall
This is an upper-level seminar on a hotly contested topic. The class will engage readings and other materials which explore questions of gender, women’s activism, local and international politics, as well as Islamic law, family law, constitutional law and international law. How does Islamic law affect Muslim women, and how do Muslim women work to change both Islamic and state law? How do state governments and international bodies handle questions of gender in the Muslim world? What historical paths has the relationship between Muslim women and the law taken, and what kind of possibilities does the future hold?
Legal 497AA, Prison & Society:
Ibikoglu, Gordon Hall
This course is designed as an introduction to the study of prisons through asocio-legal approach. In the first part of the course, rejecting simplistic
conceptualizations of prisons, we will aim to identify the various different actors within the prison society and the struggles between them. Our main goal in this endeavor is to recognize the intricate complexities of the prison society. We will especially pay attention to the question of order and legitimacy in prison. In the second part of the course, we will focus onthe different ways in which the prison society is connected to the broader society outside. In particular, we will study prisons as arenas of continuous political struggles; as socio-economic projects that fulfillc ertain functions for the dominant classes; and as spaces of domination that reproduce certain technologies and strategies of control.
497I S- The Irish Peace Process
Wing, 116 Gordon Hall
This course will examine the complex origins and manifestations of the conflict and peace on the island of Ireland with a concentration on the north of
Ireland/Northern Ireland between 1969-2009. We will explore the enduring elements of this protracted conflict and the multiple avenues through which peace and justice have been constructed. The mediation process which resulted in the 1998 Belfast Agreement (Good Friday Agreement) will be examined in depth from the perspective of the parties as well as the mediator. We will explore the present day challenges to reconstruct an economy, create a shared future and deal with the legacy of the past in the wake of decades of violence and in the context of a newly implemented powersharing government. ‘Post-conflict’ conflict transformation at the ‘coalface’ as well as in the social fabric and governmental structures will be the focus of the latter part of the semester.
497V – Immigration Debates & Public Policy
Siulc, 109 Gordon Hall
Debates about the role of immigrants in society have long been at the center of public policy discussions, particularly in election years. This course in law and public policy will focus on public debates, law making, and the construction of social facts around contemporary migrations. Instead of studying migratory experiences, the course will focus on the debates that unfold around immigration, and the roles of immigrant groups, media, elected officials, NGOs, citizens and the state when it comes to immigration policy making. Reflecting recent and upcoming debates around legislation regulating immigration and the activities of migrants, readings will focus on global expansions of immigrant detention and deportation, immigration raids, crack downs on non-citizen youth, regulation of the cultural expressions of immigrant groups, and the use of local law enforcement to police federal immigration laws. This upper level course is aimed at students interested in citizenship, crime, human rights, immigration, international law, politics/ public policy, and those considering careers in nonprofits, government agencies, or the law.
497W – Segregation, Housing Policy & Civil Rights Law in the U.S.
Levinsky, 112A Gordon Hall
