Legal Writing and Research Commons^™

Roadside Zoo: A Term In Search Of Legal Definition?, Virginia C. Thomas

Library Scholarly Publications

This article uses the example of “roadside zoo” to highlight the importance of clear definition for terms used in a legal context.

Law Library Blog (March 2022): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

Identifying Red Herrings In American Legal Research, Erin Gow

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

This article presents useful clues for British law librarians and legal researchers conducting research on American laws and legal systems. It focuses on general guidelines and key sticking points the author found when transitioning between legal research in the American and British jurisdictions.

Key skills introduced include the ability to:

• differentiate between federal and state legal jurisdictions in the U.S.,
• recognize key differences in American legal terminology and construct searches using American terms,
• analyze and select key American legal resources for different types of research questions,
• and identify American standards of legal citation.

Academic Law Librarians Are Paid 47% Less Than Their Faculty Counterparts, Olivia Smith Schlinck

Library Staff Online Writings

In December Joe Fore, the co-director of the Legal Writing program at the University of Virginia School of Law, posted to Twitter a thread comparing tenure track and legal writing salaries. In comparing four public schools, he discovered that the average starting salary for a tenure track professor was $173,000 while the average salary for all legal writing faculty was $111,000. A few academic law librarians saw the tweet and replied that someone should do the same for law librarians, too.

Introducing The Dispute Financing Library – A Free Online Resource, Ingrid Mattson

Library Staff Online Writings

NYU Law School’s Center on Civil Justice has developed an online collection of documents and media related to third-party litigation funding called the Dispute Financing Library. The Center’s goal is to create a collection of material on the topic and includes statutes, case law, journal articles, bar reports, news, best practices, and more.

W&L Law Library Newsletter, Vol. 1, Iss. 1 (Feb. 2022), The Law Library At Washington And Lee University School Of Law

W&L Law Library Newsletter

W&L Law Library Newsletter, Volume 1, Issue 1 (February 2022).

Where’S The Beef, Turkey, Butter, Cheese, Or Other Animal Ingredient?, Virginia C. Thomas

Library Scholarly Publications

The author discusses current challenges presented by federal and state labeling laws and standards pertaining to plant-based meat alternative food products.

Law Library Blog (February 2022): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

Who Are You Protecting?: A Feminist Analysis Of Gay And Trans Panic Defense Bans, How They Are Defined, And Who They Protect, Tyler S. Sesker

Undergraduate Honors Theses

As of April 2022, sixteen U.S. states ban Gay panic and Trans panic criminal defenses. These state-law prohibitions stemmed from several high-profile murder trials, focusing on the identity of the decedent, including the killings of Matthew Shepard and Latisha King. Between 1970 and 2020, criminal defenses interrogating the gender identity or sexual identity of victims of violence were used at least 104 times, with nearly a third of those cases resulting in reduced criminal charges and penalties. Today, in thirty-four states, the same tactics remain legal. Applying a feminist and outsider legal lens, this study engages in a textual analysis …

Deepfakes, Shallowfakes, And The Need For A Private Right Of Action, Eric Kocsis

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

For nearly as long as there have been photographs and videos, people have been editing and manipulating them to make them appear to be something they are not. Usually edited or manipulated photographs are relatively easy to detect, but those days are numbered. Technology has no morality; as it advances, so do the ways it can be misused. The lack of morality is no clearer than with deepfake technology.

People create deepfakes by inputting data sets, most often pictures or videos into a computer. A series of neural networks attempt to mimic the original data set until they are nearly …

Restricting Funeral Expense Deductions, William A. Drennan

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

During the Middle Ages, the wealthy often requested burial in mass graves with their fellow mortals, as a sign of humility. But since the rise of the cult of the individual during the Renaissance, individual burial plots have been an expression of prestige, wealth, and social status for some. For example, Leona Helmsley, real estate baroness and “Queen of Mean,” dedicated $3 million upon her death for the care and maintenance of her 1300 square foot, $1.4 million mausoleum. Respectful disposition of the body is a hallmark of civilization and a common law requirement of estate administration, but an extravagant …

The Writing’S On The Wall: Using Multimedia Presentation Principles From The Museum World To Improve Law School Pedagogy, Cecilia A. Silver

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Law school pedagogy is a relic. Nearly 150 years after Christopher Langdell pioneered the case method, the typical doctrinal course remains predominantly a verbal domain, featuring lectures, Socratic dialogue, and final exams. But the visual disconnect between legal education and legal practice does students a disservice. Under the proliferating influence of laptops, iPads, smartphones, and Zoom, students now read, work, and study electronically more than they ever have before. So instead of business as usual, it’s time to embrace “visualization”—using multimedia to enhance, or even supplant, the near-exclusive reliance on language—to build a more vibrant and inclusive learning environment.

Law …

Book Review: This Is How They Tell Me The World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race (2020) By Nicole Perlroth, Amy C. Gaudion

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

No abstract provided.

Law Library Blog (January 2022): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

A Proportionality-Based Framework For Government Regulation Of Digital Tracing Apps In Times Of Emergency, Sharon Bassan

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Times of emergency present an inherent conflict between the public interest and the preservation of individual rights. Such times require granting emergency powers to the government on behalf of the public interest and relaxing safeguards against government actions that infringe rights. The lack of theoretical framework to assess governmental decisions in times of emergency leads to a polarized and politicized discourse about potential policies, and often, to public distrust and lack of compliance.

Such a discourse was evident regarding Digital Tracing Apps (“DTAs”), which are apps installed on cellular phones to alert users that they were exposed to people who …

Lessons From Psychology For Law Practice Management, Peter G. Glenn

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

No abstract provided.

"Should Supreme Court Justices Fear Access To Their Papers? An Empirical Study Of The Use Of Three Archival Collections", Susan Demaine, Benjamin J. Keele

Books & Book Chapters by Maurer Faculty

Susan deMaine's contribution to this volume is "Should Supreme Court Justices Fear Access to Their Papers? An Empirical Study of the Use of Three Archival Collections." Co-authored by Benjamin J. Keele.

US. Supreme Court justices typically donate their working papers to archives upon their retirement, often with lengthy embargoes. 1 Researchers have debated whether the justices should be required to retain and disclose their papers as government · records, but there has been little study of how the papers are used in scholarly and journalistic discussions of the Court.· This empirical study examines how the papers of Justices William Brennan, …

"Exploring Citation Count Methods Of Measuring Faculty Scholarly Impact", Margaret Kiel-Morse

Books & Book Chapters by Maurer Faculty

Margaret Kiel-Morse's contribution to this volume is "Exploring Citation Count Methods of Measuring Faculty Scholarly Impact."

After US News & World Report's announcement in 2019 that they will provide a separate ranking of law schools based on faculty scholarly impact, scrutinizing the various methods of assessing scholarly impact has been a hot topic. The various methods include reputation surveys, citation counts, and publication counts. This paper focuses on citation counts. Several methods of conducting citation counts have been circulated since the 1990s, notably Brian Leiter 's studies using Westlaw 's Law Reviews and Journals database; the Leiter study updates conducted …

"Capturing Impact: Telling The Story Of Your Scholarship Beyond The Citation Count", Ashley A. Ahlbrand

Books & Book Chapters by Maurer Faculty

Ashley Ahlbrand's contribution to this volume is "Capturing Impact: Telling the Story of Your Scholarship Beyond the Citation Count."

When we conduct research, what is our end goal? Who is our audience? Since the mid-20th century, with the development, first, of journal citation indexes, then journal impact factors, then journal citation metrics for individuals, academia has seen increased pressure to publish and be cited in journals within one 's discipline. These citation metrics are used to compare schools and to evaluate scholars for promotion and tenure, for grant consideration, and for bestowing other awards and honors. Discipline-specific journal citations tend …

Law Library Blog (December 2021): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

Dare To Dream: How Would You Teach 1ls Legal Research With No Restrictions?, Olivia Smith Schlinck

Library Staff Online Writings

When I started in my current role as an instructional librarian, I was given space to make the changes I thought necessary to improve an already-changing legal research program. I’ve made changes – some small, some more major – in both the 1L and upper-level research curriculum, but there is more to do. In particular, I’m not entirely satisfied with how we teach legal research to 1Ls.

Integrating Doctrine And Diversity Speaker Series: Making Space, Taking Space 11-16-2021, Roger Williams University School Of Law

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

No abstract provided.

Legal Corpus Linguistics And The Half-Empirical Attitude, Anya Bernstein

Journal Articles

Legal writers have recently turned to corpus linguistics to interpret legal texts. Corpus linguistics, a social-science methodology, provides a sophisticated way to analyze large data sets of language use. Legal proponents have touted it as giving empirical grounding to claims about ordinary language, which pervade legal interpretation. But legal corpus linguistics cannot deliver on that promise because it ignores the crucial contexts in which legal language is produced, interpreted, and deployed.

First, legal corpus linguistics neglects the relevant legal context—the conditions that give legal language authority. Because of this, legal corpus studies’ evidence about language use perversely obscures and misstates …

Negative Commentary—Negative Consequences: Legal Ethics, Social Media, And The Impact Of Explosive Commentary, Jan L. Jacobowitz Ms.

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

Connecting and sharing on social media has opened communication channels and provided instantaneous information to billions of people worldwide. Commentary on current events, cases, and negative online reviews may be posted in an instant, often without pause or thought about the potential repercussions. This global phenomenon may not only provide news of the day updates, humor, and support for those in need but also is replete with ethical landmines for the unwary lawyer. Lawyers commenting on current events, their cases, or responding to a client’s negative online review, have suffered damage to their careers. In some instances, they have even …

Is Open Access Equal Access? Pacer User Fees And Public Access To Court Information, John L. Moreland

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Our country has a long history of striving for openness and transparency in government processes. In 1978, the United States Supreme Court held, “It is clear that the courts of this country recognize a general right to insect and copy public records and documents, including judicial records and documents.” Long before America’s high court recognized this common law principle, court records were historically accessible for inspection by lawyers, journalists, land title companies, credit agencies, academics, and members of the general public. These individuals were also permitted to take notes as a part of their right to inspect court documents. Having …

Law Students, Covid-19, And Big Feelings, Olivia Smith Schlinck

Library Staff Online Writings

It’s Fall 2021 and well . . . we’re back. Or rather – some of us are. Along with a patchwork of universities requiring vaccinations and/or masks for students comes a patchwork of modes of instruction: fully online, hybrid, fully in-person (and subject to change). Some employees have shifted to occasional work-from-home models while others are required to be in-person every day. It’s all very complicated. Honestly, right now everything is complicated. With big, complicated situations come big, complicated feelings, and our students’ feelings are certainly that: big.

Law Library Blog (September 2021): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

Law Library Blog (October 2021): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.

Legal Corpus Linguistics And The Half-Empirical Attitude, Anya Bernstein

Faculty Scholarship

Legal writers have recently turned to corpus linguistics to interpret legal texts. Corpus linguistics, a social-science methodology, provides a sophisticated way to analyze large data sets of language use. Legal proponents have touted it as giving empirical grounding to claims about ordinary language, which pervade legal interpretation. But legal corpus linguistics cannot deliver on that promise because it ignores the crucial contexts in which legal language is produced, interpreted, and deployed.

First, legal corpus linguistics neglects the relevant legal context—the conditions that give legal language authority. Because of this, legal corpus studies’ evidence about language use perversely obscures and misstates …

Law Library Blog (August 2021): Legal Beagle's Blog Archive, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Law Library Newsletters/Blog

No abstract provided.