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Undergraduate Program

Course Offerings

CORE COURSES

Law and Society
V62.0001 (Section 1)  Identical to V53.0335. Offered once every year, usually in the Fall.
An introduction to the study of law as a political practice. We treat law as a political practice from a multiple disciplinary standpoint, examining how law and a range of legal institutions embody and constitute political, cultural, economic, and social forces. We examine the mobilization of rights, the use of litigation and vernacular legal discourse, largely within the context of the United States , but with reference to transnational struggles. In the course of doing so, we study the relationship between making social policy and the use of litigation by social movements. Specifically, we study litigation strategies at the appellate and trial levels by focusing on three sociolegal movements: the civil rights movement; the women's movement; and class action tort cases. What are the political dimensions of legal arguments and legal remedies for racial and gender discrimination and toxic torts? Under what conditions law is an empowering and/or effective political resource? What are the limits of legality in the making of social change?

Law and Society
V62.0001 (Section 2)  Identical to V93.0413. Offered once every year, usually in the Spring.
Sociological perspectives on law and legal institutions. The meaning and complexity of legal issues; the relation between law and social change; the effects of law; uses of law to overcome social disadvantage. Topics: "limits of law," legal disputes and the courts, regulation, comparative legal systems, legal education, organization of legal work, and lawyers' careers.

ELECTIVE COURSES

Topics in Law and Society
V62.0251, V62.0252  Offered every semester.
Employs a seminar format to enable students to explore a critical topic in Law and Society in depth. The course covers a wide range of topics. Some of the topics are (1) Law, Culture, and Politics, (2) Law and Human Rights, (3) Gender, Politics, and Law, (4) Juvenile Justice, (5) Punishment and Welfare, (6) Global Sweatshop, (7) Gender, Violence, and the Law, and (8) Problem Solving Courts.

Independent Study
V62.0997 and V62.0998  Offered every semester.

Human Rights and Anthropology
V62.0326  Identical to V14.0326. Prerequisite: V14.0001 or permission of the instructor. McLagan. 4 points.
An anthropological perspective on the globalization of human rights in the post-cold war era. Commitment to "local culture" has sometimes positioned anthropologists in critical opposition to universal values and transnational processes such as human rights. Explores this legacy and consider the ways in which human rights are constituted as a field of action and how it is structured by transnational discourses and practices. Course has an important media Internet/Web component.

The Constitution and People of Color
V15.0327  Identical to V53.0801, V62.0327, and V11.0327. Offered every other semester. 4 points.
Examines how the American legal system decided constitutional challenges affecting the empowerment of African, Latino, and Asian American communities from the 19th century to the present. Topics include the denial of citizenship and naturalization to slaves and immigrants, government-sanctioned segregation, the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, the prison industry, police brutality, post-9/11 detention issues, and voting rights. Course requirements include attendance at a community function involving constitutional issues, a midterm, and an interactive oral and written final project comparing a present-day issue affecting racial minorities in New York City and proposing measures to collectively address the issue.

History of Ancient Law
V27.0292  Given periodically. 4 points.
Examines the development of law and legal systems and the relationships of these to the societies that created them, starting with some ancient Near Eastern systems and working down to the Roman period. The main focus is on the fully developed system of Roman law.

Law, Economics, and Society
V31.0355  Formerly Economics of the Law (V31.0255). Prerequisite: V31.0010 Offered every year. 4 points.
Deals with classic topics in law and economics, as well as law and society. Topics include tort law, criminal law and racial profiling, the efficient allocation of property rights, and the possibility of order without law. The methodological approach is a game-theoretical one. Provides a fair amount of the required technical background; concepts introduced include dominant strategies, Nash Equilibrium, dynamic games, and backward induction.

Journalism Ethics and First Amendment Law
V54.0502 Prerequisite: V54.0501

Offered in the spring. 4 points.

This 14-week class is divided equally between ethics and the law.  Through the weekly lecture and assigned readings, students are exposed to the various ethical and legal issues surrounding the field of journalism and come away with a clear sense of the role of the journalist in society and the issues that affect that mission today.

Law and Urban Problems
V99.0232  Lasdon, Carey. Given every semester. 4 points.
Interdisciplinary introduction to the law as it interacts with society. Analysis focuses on problems in areas such as housing, zoning, welfare, and consumer affairs, emphasizing the underlying social, economic, and political causes of the problems and the responses made by lawmakers and courts. Readings are drawn from the law and social science. No specific knowledge of law is required.

Islam and Politics
V77.0674  Given every year. 4 points.
Explains the rise of Islamic political movements in the contemporary Middle East and looks at the various ways in which they have been discussed in the media and in academic writings. Examples of Islamist writings and publications are also presented in order to elucidate the ways in which Islamists depict themselves and their concerns. Because of the nature of these movements, the course has a multidisciplinary approach, drawing on concepts from politics, history, and law.

Seminar: Islamic Law and Society
V77.0780  Given every year. 4 points.
Introduces students to Islamic law through a reading of its various genres and a study of a selection of secondary sources covering a number of substantive topics (e.g., ritual, criminal, and public law). The course also focuses on the ways Islamic law has interacted with Islamic societies in historical practice and the way it has adapted, or not adapted, to the challenges of modernity.

Seminar: Women and Islamic Law
V77.0783  Identical to V65.0783. Given every year. 4 points.
The aim of this course is to acquaint students with the ways Islamic law has treated women in theory and practice. Students are exposed to medieval and modern legal texts regarding the status of women as believers, daughters, wives, mothers, and legal persons. Case studies from different periods of Islamic history are read and discussed as well as writings from contemporary anthropology.

Philosophy of Law
V83.0052  Given every other year. 4 points.
Examines the nature of law, its relations to morality, and its limits. Topics: positivism and natural law theory, theories of criminal justice and punishment; concepts of liberty, responsibility, and rights. Considers the views of such thinkers as Austin, Bentham, Dworkin, Fuller, Hart, Rawls, and others.

The American Constitution
V53.0330  Given every semester. 4 points.
Interpretation of the U.S. Constitution through the reading of Supreme Court opinions. Distribution of constitutional power among Congress, the president, and the federal courts; between the national government and the states; and among the states. Constitutional law and American political and economic development. Cases are read and discussed closely for their legal and philosophical content.

Civil Liberties
V53.0332  Given every semester. 4 points.
Interpretation of the Bill of Rights, the Civil War amendments, and other rights in the U.S. Constitution through the reading of Supreme Court opinions. Topics include freedom of speech and press; free exercise of religion and separation of church and state; the right of privacy; rights of the criminally accused; equal protection of the law against race, gender, and other discrimination; and the rights of franchise and citizenship. Cases are read and discussed closely for their legal and philosophical content.

American Law and Legal System
V53.0334  Prerequisite: V53.0300 or permission of the instructor. Given every other year. 4 points.
Introduction to law and the legal system through the reading of actual cases. Topics include the adjudication of conflict, the structure and functions of trial and appellate courts, civil and criminal procedure, judicial remedies, judicial decision making, and the limits of judicial relief. Uses tort, contract, property, divorce, and other law for illustration.

Gender in Law
V53.0336  Identical to V97.0336. Given every other year. 4 points. Examines the relationship between gender politics, legal theory, and social policy. Studies the role that the legal arena and certain historical conditions have played in creating, revising, and protecting particular gender identities and not others and examines the political effects of those legal constructions. Analyzes the major debates in feminist legal theory, including theories of equality, the problem of essentialism, and the relevance of standpoint epistomology. In addition to examining how the law understands sex discrimination in the workplace and the feminization of the legal profession, also addresses to what extent understandings of the gender affect how law regulates the physical body by looking at the regulation of reproduction and of consensual sexual activity. In light of all of the above, considers to what extent law is or is not an effective political resource in reforming notions of gender in law and society.

The Politics of Administrative Law
V53.0354  Given every other year. 4 points.
Examines legal, political, and economic issues in government regulation. Covers such classic debates and issues as the historical origins of regulation, the legal philosophy of administrative regulation, the relationship between courts and agencies, the political and social conflicts surrounding regulatory politics, and the role of law in state formation.

The Sociology of Law
V93.0417  Identical to V62.0417. Greenberg. 4 points.
This course is an interdisciplinary survey course in social science approaches to law. It offers an overview of the theories that social scientists have developed to understand law, and the research they have carried out to test those theories. The course takes up such questions as: How have social scientists conceptualized law? How do social science perspectives on law contrast with those of philosophy and jurisprudence? What social processes shape the formulation of law, and its application to particular cases? What roles does law play in the functioning of society? How is it implicated in social change? What are the possibilities for using law is to overcome disadvantages associated with class, race, sex, and sexual orientation? What are the limitations of legal methods for overcoming disadvantage. How can we understand the functioning of the courts in criminal prosecutions, and in civil disputes?

Deviance and Social Control
V93.0502  Identical to V62.0502. Dixon , Greenberg, Horowitz. Offered every year. 4 points.
How statuses and behaviors come to be considered deviant or normal; theories of causation, deviant cultures, communities, and careers. Functioning of social control agencies. The politics of deviance. Consideration of policy implications.

Criminology
V93.0503  Identical to V62.0503. Dixon , Garland , Greenberg. Offered every year. 4 points.
Examines the making of criminal laws and their enforcement by police, courts, prisons, probation and parole, and other agencies. Criminal behavior systems, theories of crime and delinquency causation, victimization, corporate and governmental crime, and crime in the mass media. Policy questions.

Juvenile Delinquency
V93.0504  Horowitz. Offered every two years. 4 points.
Examines juvenile delinquency as a legal and social condition. The extent and distribution of juvenile offenses, both geographically and demographically, its causes and consequences. The role of class, status, opportunity structures, school, and family in causing delinquency and shaping responses to delinquency. Gangs. Evaluates various forms of individual and group treatment and legal approaches to delinquency control through the police, detention centers, juvenile courts, and training schools.