About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

75 Geo. L. J. 1 (1986-1987)
Demystifying Legal Scholarship

handle is hein.journals/glj75 and id is 23 raw text is: COMMENTARY Demystifying Legal Scholarship ROGER C. CRAMTON* INTRODUCTION It is a great pleasure to join you today in celebration of legal scholarship. My pleasure is moderated by the penance I performed in preparation for today's event: reviewing the verbose and narcissistic recent literature in which legal scholars have flagellated themselves and each other in an effort to portray a past, present, and future for our scholarly endeavors.' I am decon- structed, delegitimated, demystified, overwhelmed by contradiction, fed up with hegemonies (legitimate or illegitimate), and persuaded of the marginal- ity of much of the exercise.2 Even though I'm confused, uncertain, and ex- hausted, the search for the Holy Grail of scholarship attracts me like a moth to a candle. My only sure conclusion is that it must be more fun to be a trasher than a trashee.3 William James described a classic encounter between scientific truth and a commitment of faith. A prominent scientist had just given a brilliant lecture on the foundations of the universe. During the question period an elderly woman suggested that there was a problem with the professor's analysis. What is that? asked the professor cautiously. It's all wrong, the woman replied, because the universe actually rests on the back of a giant turtle. The professor, taken aback, forced a smile and then countered: If that's the case there is still the question, what is that turtle standing on? The audience tittered, but the woman, undaunted, replied: Another, much larger turtle. * Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law and former Dean, Cornell Law School. A.B. 1950, Harvard University; J.D. 1955, University of Chicago. The author served as President of the Asso- ciation of American Law Schools during 1985. This paper grew out of a talk at the Georgetown University Law Center on May 2, 1986. The author is indebted for inspiration to an essay by Sanford Levinson, Professing Law: Commitment of Faith or Detached Analysis?, Richard J. Chil- dress Memorial Lecture, St. Louis University Law School, March 20, 1986, reprinted in 31 ST. Louis U.L.J. 3 (1986). He has also benefited from conversations with Greg Alexander, Jim Henderson, and Bob Summers, as well as from written comments of Lash Lame, David Lyons, Marie Provine, and Tom Shaffer. 1. For a modest sampling of this growing literature, see Legal Scholarship: Its Nature and Pur- poses, 90 YALE L.J. 955 (1981); American Legal Scholarship: Directions and Dilemmas, 33 J. LEGAL EDUC. 403 (1983). 2. For illumination of this terminology, see Critical Legal Studies Symposium, 36 STAN. L. REV. 1 (1984). 3. See Freeman, Truth and Mystification in Legal Scholarship, 90 YALE L.J. 1229, 1230 (1981) (trashing is fun).

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most