Legal Studies Research Methods (207-0-20)
Instructors
Robert L Nelson
Robert L. Nelson is Professor of Sociology and Law at Northwestern University and the MacCrate Research Chair in the Legal Profession at the American Bar Foundation (where he was Director 2004-2015). He holds a J.D. and Ph.D. in sociology, both from Northwestern, and has held several positions of academic leadership throughout his career. He is a leading scholar in the fields of the legal profession and discrimination law. He has authored or edited 10 books and numerous articles, including Legalizing Gender Inequality, Cambridge University Press 1999, which won the prize for best book in sociology in 2001, and Urban Lawyers: The New Social Structure of the Bar, University of Chicago Press 2005, and Rights on Trial: How Workplace Discrimination Law Perpetuates Inequality, University of Chicago Press 2017. His current research includes After the JD, a national study of the careers of lawyers, which is tracking the entering bar class of 2000 for the first 12 years of their careers.
Meeting Info
Locy Hall 111: Tues, Thurs 11:00AM - 12:20PM
Overview of class
LEGAL ST 207/SOCIOL 227 Legal Studies Research Methods introduces students to research methods used in interdisciplinary legal studies, including jurisprudence and legal reasoning, qualitative and quantitative social science methods, and historical and textual analysis. The course is a prerequisite for the Advanced Research Seminar in Legal Studies, 398-1,- 2, and is intended to prepare students for the design of their own research project to be conducted in 398-1, -2. Through exposure to and engagement with interdisciplinary research methods on law and legal processes, the course will provide students with a deeper understanding of law in its historical and social context. The course will provide students with a set of research tools with which to conduct research on legal institutions. The course builds on content from Legal Studies 206, a prerequisite for 207. While part of the Legal Studies major sequence, the course will enrich the analytic skills of students from many fields who are interested in law or in interdisciplinary research methods.
Prerequisite: LEGAL ST 206. Taught with SOCIOL 227; may not receive credit for both courses. The topical focus of the course will be violence by the police and capital punishment in the United States. These topics will be explored with interdisciplinary readings and relevant legal cases. Students will be exposed to several research tools and research processes, as they also engage with material on police violence and capital punishment. In addition to shorter assignments, students will develop a small research project and write a research paper on a topic of their choosing.
Learning Objectives
Once you complete Legal Studies Research Methods, you should be able to:
- Read and analyze diverse primary legal and political sources carefully and accurately, with attention to the author's perspective, position, and credibility, and to the source's general context.
- Be familiar with research methods and best practices regarding qualitative and quantitative data, written materials, and electronic databases.
- Read, evaluate, summarize, and engage with scholarly works by others, and be able to analyze authors' arguments for evidence, context, strength, and credibility.
- Generate original research questions regarding the relationship of law and society and devise research strategies for answering research questions.
- Make clearly written and organized arguments that are well supported by primary sources.
- Critically assess how courts and other authorities use social science in their decisions and policymaking
Teaching Method
The only class meetings are two 80-minute class meetings a week. There are no discussion sections. Class sessions are meant to provide an opportunity for active engagement with assigned readings. Students are expected to come to class prepared to discuss assigned material. Groups of students will be assigned responsibility for leading class discussions on a rotating basis.
Evaluation Method
Assignments [total: 194 points not counting extra credit opportunities—subject to modification] - • active and informed participation in class discussions - 10 points • Attendance - 2 points per (actual) class up to maximum of 28 points • Assignment One - Case Brief - 10 points • Assignment Two - Position Paper - 25 points • Assignment Three - Reflection on Research Question - 10 points • Assignment Four - Lexis/Nexis Uni-Zotero exercise - 10 points • Assignment Five - Critique of Epp et al. and implications for Strieff - 25 points • Progress Report on research question, literature review, plan for data collection - 5 points • Progress Report on data collection and analysis - 5 points • Progress Report on overall paper - 5 points • Assignment Seven - Research Project and Research Paper on some aspect of either capital punishment or police violence - 75 points
Class Materials (Required)
We will read selections from two books, several articles, and a few Supreme Court opinions. Although all required chapters will be available online, the books are available for purchase through Amazon.com or your favorite online vendor. Other readings will be available through Canvas or e-reserve. You can print them all at once, print them each day, or read them in electronic format. But you must keep up with these readings and we require you to bring the scheduled readings, in some format, to each class. Some additional short texts (e.g., timely news articles) may be emailed to you and/or added as web links to Canvas during the course. Books: Epp, Maynard-Moody, and Haider-Markel, Pulled Over: How Police Stops Define Race and Citizenship (University of Chicago Press, 2014), isbn-13:978-0-226-11399-9; Sarat, When the State Kills: Capital Punishment and the American Condition (2002, Princeton University Press), isbn 0-691-10261-9. Additional recommended reading will be available via Canvas and various NU library databases.
Class Attributes
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area