Scholarly Legal Writing

Scholarly Legal Writing

The education of lawyers must not merely involve the acquisition of knowledge and skills; it must include the cultivation of creative thinking and imagination, the appreciation of the commonality of the human condition, and development of a sense of judgment and responsibility. Hence, lawyering includes the ability to understand and critique existing and emerging visions of the profession in relation to interdisciplinary and multicultural perspectives, the implications of technology, and the consequences of economic globalization.#

As the preceding quotation suggests, legal scholarship has a major impact on the future of the profession. The future of any legal student must begin with a strong foundation of legal knowledge. A cornerstone of this foundation must be the practice and interpretation of scholarly legal writing.

Scholarly legal writing in itself can be a very complex, even scary term for law students to understand and apply. However, the way in which legal writing is applied may very well hold the key to whether or not the writing is understood and properly judged.

During the course of this paper, I will demonstrate and shed understanding on the effective writing process of scholarly legal writing a student will encounter in law school. I will show and explain the writing style as well as examine the different writing styles used. I will give an understanding of how scholarly/critical legal writing is relevant in the development and usage of other legal writing skills.

Finally, I will show an essay I created to demonstrate many of the scholarly legal writing skills and techniques this paper shows. I believe you will find the techniques and strategies in this paper to be...

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...ve legal scholarship has a strong bearing on the future of the legal profession. If we continue to not only take in question what is or what works, but what might, could, should or should not be, we will continue to have stimulating debate and a strong democracy.

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Bibliography

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Monk, C. Carl. (1993). Memorandum, Association of American law School, to Deans of

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Stoddard, Thomas. (1994). Why Gay people Should Seek the Right To Marry.