Fall 2019 Class Schedule: Center for Legal Studies

Fall 2019 Class Schedule

To read course descriptions, click on the course titles below.
To look up class meeting days and times please go to CAESAR.
Note that courses are subject to change.

Course	Title	Instructor
LEGAL_ST 206-0-20	Law and Society (also SOCIOL 206)	Laura Beth Nielsen
LEGAL_ST 206-0-20 Law and Society (also SOCIOL 206) Law is everywhere. Law permits, prohibits, enables, legitimates, protects, and prosecutes citizens. Law shapes our daily lives in countless ways. This course examines the connections and relationships of law and society using an interdisciplinary social science approach. As one of the founders of the Law and Society movement observed, "Law is too important to leave to lawyers." Accordingly, this course will borrow from several theoretical, disciplinary, and interdisciplinary perspectives (including sociology, history, anthropology, political science, and psychology) in order to explore the sociology of law and law's role. This course introduces the relationship between social, cultural, political, and economic forces on the one hand, and legal rules, practices, and outcomes, on the other. We focus on several important questions about law including: How do culture, structure, and conflict explain the relationship between law and society? Why do people obey the law? Why do people go to court? How does the legal system work? What is the role of lawyers, judges, and juries? How does law on the books differ from law in action? How do social problems become legal ones? How can law create or constrain social change?
LEGAL_ST 305-0-20	American Immigration (taught with HISTORY 305)	Shana Bernstein
LEGAL_ST 305-0-20 American Immigration (taught with HISTORY 305) This course introduces students to the social, political, legal, and cultural history of immigration in the United States. In addition to exploring the history of southern and eastern European immigrants, it uses a comparative framework to integrate Latin American and Asian migrants into our understanding of immigration since the late nineteenth century. The course is an exploration of major themes in immigration history rather than a comprehensive examination. Issues students will consider include immigration law, acculturation, community, racial formation, victimization vs. agency, the transnational and international context of immigration, and competing notions of citizenship, among others.
LEGAL_ST 308-0-20	Sociology of Law (taught with SOCIOL 318)	Robert Nelson
LEGAL_ST 308-0-20 Sociology of Law (taught with SOCIOL 318) This course examines the relationship between law and the distribution of power in society, with a particular emphasis on law and social change in the United States. Readings will be drawn from the social sciences and history, as well as selected court cases that raise critical questions about the role of race, gender, and sexual orientation in American society. Among the material we will examine are the documents made public in the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Students should be aware that some of this material is graphic and disturbing.
LEGAL_ST 332-0-20	Constitutional Law I (also POLI SCI 332)	Galya Benarieh
LEGAL_ST 332-0-20 Constitutional Law I (also POLI SCI 332) This course investigates the structure of American government as laid out by the Constitution. It will also examine the many controversies over what, exactly, the Constitution means, who gets to decide, and how. We will discuss judicial review, the powers of Congress and the executive branch, and the relationship between the federal government and the states.
LEGAL_ST 398-1-20	Advanced Research Seminar (Majors Only)	Joanna Grisinger
LEGAL_ST 398-1-20 Advanced Research Seminar (Majors Only) Legal Studies 398-1,2 is a two-quarter sequence required for all Legal Studies majors. This seminar exposes students to a variety of theoretical and methodological approaches to law and legal institutions; over two quarters, students will develop their own research paper on a topic of interest.