Repairing the Disconnect between the Classroom and the Bluebook: An Interdisciplinary Method
8 Pages Posted: 18 Oct 2014
Date Written: 2013
Abstract
In Repairing the Disconnect Between the Classroom and the Bluebook: An Interdisciplinary Method, Professor Garretson recognizes the strong intersection between writing and thinking – and the necessity of professors to teach both. In this article, she demonstrates a collaborative way to teach the law by incorporates writing skills and techniques.
By collaborating with Professor Kinney, PhD of English and an Assistant Professor of English and Rhetoric at the State University of New York, Binghamton and a legal writing professor, Professor Garretson produced a teaching method that embraces a writing-to-learn philosophy. This method 1) teaches doctrine by using writing assignments in doctrinal classes, and 2) explains the requirements of legal writing using a common language all students can understand and apply. In describing this method, Professor Garretson suggests how to fix the disconnect between law students’ knowledge and their writing.
Collaboration across disciplines increases coherence and requires faculty to take a holistic view of the curriculum. The article points out that failure to collaborate among and between disciplines perpetrates a false dichotomy and does not further the goals of all law-school professors, which is to teach students the law and how to analyze it. Destroying this dichotomy, she argues, will benefit both our institutions and the profession.
Keywords: legal writing, legal knowledge, legal teaching, law students, law school professor, legal analysis
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