LM101 | Legal Methods

The goal of the Legal Methods course is to introduce you to the various methods employed in the study and practice of the law. This is an introductory course meant to orient you with the learning experience that lies ahead in law school and to form a bridge between your schooling and the university. In particular, Legal Methods has four goals:

First, to understand the basics of research and writing, i.e how to formulate appropriate research questions, identify the research methodology, construct hypotheses, engage with primary and secondary sources, read and analyse materials in the law and related liberal arts disciplines closely and critically, synthesize and construct original arguments and articulate them in clear and coherent ways both in writing and orally.

Second, to introduce ways of reading the law, through an understanding of rules – what we call ‘positive law’ – and the social, political and moral context in which these rules are understood and practiced. An ideational, institutional and systemic understanding of the law will allow you to understand the nature and structure of legal reasoning.

Third, to understand and importantly, experience, the dialogic nature of argumentation and of the central place of interpretation and reasoned disagreement in a community.

Finally, to reflect on the place of the law, and your position as lawyers and citizens, in the larger social compass you inhabit.

This course is narrowly tailored to focus on the foundational skills you will require through law school. You will find that the learning in Legal Methods extends to the other courses offered in the first trimester and you are encouraged to make these links explicit.