Law Talk

Abstract:     
The relationship between speech and writing has been a major issue in composition theory in recent decades. This article reviews the primary trends in composition theory that deal with the relationship between speech and writing in an effort to bring this discussion to the law school community. The article explores the specific discourse community that law students find themselves in, with the dissonance between the oral discussions of reading that predominate in the law school classroom and the evaluation based on written examinations that follows that discussion. It proposes ways to change the polarity of the law school writing class so that students can ease their entry into the new discourse community of law through talking with each other directly about their writing.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 34

Keywords: legal research and writing, discourse community, composition theory

Accepted Paper Series