A post . . . about law school?!
Despite the name of my blog (Dan-at-Boalt) I don't talk much about law school.
Mostly that's because I think its a) boring for others, b) a bit pretentious, and c) a weird instutition that skews people's values. That might be true of upper academia as a whole; maybe the academy is a factory for spewing out egomaniacal blowhards. Some who are full of themselves (the law professor who wrote an article naming himself the top public intellectual in the country) and others who bask in their school's reflected glory (my friend Nick reminded me of a professor at our alma mater who went to [Leland] Stanford [Jr. Horse College] and so "he had to mention Stanford three Stanford times every Stanford sentence.")
As for me, I want to be part of the academy because I want to be turned into a pretentious ass (people who know me are, at this moment, saying, "what does he mean turned into one"). Therefore it was good news that I got elected to the editorial board of my journal. Its a cool journal (probably one of the top 5 reasons I came to Boalt) and my position, Notes and Comments Editor, allows me to decide what student work can get in. We mostly publish professors' articles (unlike other fields, there are almost no peer-reviewed journals in law) but sometimes, if a student writes a really good article, we'll put it in. So its my job to decide what counts as really good.
In any case, I'm looking forward to this summer where I'll be overpaid based on my skills and charged with suffling wealth among giant corporations while ensuring that none of it makes its way into the hands of people who need it.
Mostly that's because I think its a) boring for others, b) a bit pretentious, and c) a weird instutition that skews people's values. That might be true of upper academia as a whole; maybe the academy is a factory for spewing out egomaniacal blowhards. Some who are full of themselves (the law professor who wrote an article naming himself the top public intellectual in the country) and others who bask in their school's reflected glory (my friend Nick reminded me of a professor at our alma mater who went to [Leland] Stanford [Jr. Horse College] and so "he had to mention Stanford three Stanford times every Stanford sentence.")
As for me, I want to be part of the academy because I want to be turned into a pretentious ass (people who know me are, at this moment, saying, "what does he mean turned into one"). Therefore it was good news that I got elected to the editorial board of my journal. Its a cool journal (probably one of the top 5 reasons I came to Boalt) and my position, Notes and Comments Editor, allows me to decide what student work can get in. We mostly publish professors' articles (unlike other fields, there are almost no peer-reviewed journals in law) but sometimes, if a student writes a really good article, we'll put it in. So its my job to decide what counts as really good.
In any case, I'm looking forward to this summer where I'll be overpaid based on my skills and charged with suffling wealth among giant corporations while ensuring that none of it makes its way into the hands of people who need it.
posted by Daniel at 3/21/2006 01:23:00 PM
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