Literature and the Law

Undergraduate / Graduate

This course explores what literature can teach us about the law, and vice-versa. Through fiction, films, statutes, and court cases drawn from the legal and literary history of the United States, students will ask questions such as: How do legal concepts rely on literary techniques such as storytelling? What laws shape literature, both in its writing and in its reception in society? And how do we interpret the language of both literary and legal texts? Course topics will be organized roughly around major practice areas of the law-such as contracts, torts, property, constitutional, and criminal law-as well as cases presently before the Supreme Court. Students interested in legal and non-legal careers alike will explore the history, context, and unfolding present of the laws and literature of the United States. Likely readings include work by authors Charles Chesnutt, Herman Melville, and Toni Morrison as well as landmark court cases Plessy v. Ferguson, Griswold v. Connecticut, and Obergefell v. Hodges.