Saul Levmore : Courses and Seminars
Copyright
LAWS 45801
This course explores the major areas of copyright law, with special emphasis on how modern technology might challenge traditional copyright principles. Topics include copyright duration, subject matter, and ownership; the rights and limitations of copyright holders, including the fair use doctrine; remedies for copyright infringement; and federal preemption of state law.
The student's grade is based on a final examination.
Autumn 2011
Saul Levmore
Greenberg Seminar: The Internet Generation
LAWS 95902
This Greenberg Seminar will read and discuss popular as well as academic thinking about the impact of the Internet on its first generation of full-time users, as well as the impact this generation is having on the future of the Internet and society. We plan to read such books as Jonathan Zittrain's The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It; Sherry Turkle's Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other; Nicholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains; The Googlization of Everything (and Why We Should Worry) by Siva Vaidhyanathan; and perhaps Tim Wu's The Master Switch.
Graded Pass/Fail.
The instructors will provide the books and will meet on Thursday evenings in the faculty members' home.
Autumn 2011
Saul Levmore, Julie Roin
Public Choice
LAWS 69001
This course focuses on the relationship between modern perspectives on voting and interest groups on the one hand and legislation and judicial interventions on the other. Public choice is essentially the science of collective decision-making, and it comes with several well developed tools of analysis. With these tools, and that perspective, we revisit the interactions between legislatures and judges, democracy's attempt to solve certain problems, and the roles played by a variety of legal doctrines and constitutional institutions (from takings law to line-item vetoes and to the meaning of precedents). As the course proceeds, we explore specific topics in law, such as the possibility of judicial vote-trading, the role of referenda in some jurisdictions but not others, and the role of precedent itself.
Grades will be based on an examination, but students can choose to generate half their grade with a short paper related to a topic encountered in class.
Autumn 2011
Saul Levmore
Torts
LAWS 30611
The focus of this course, offered over two sequential quarters, is on the Anglo-American system (mainly judge-created) of the liability for personal injury to person or property. Special stress is laid on the legal doctrines governing accidental injury, such as negligence and strict liability, assumption of risk, and the duty requirement. The rules for determining damages in personal-injury cases are discussed. Alternative theories of tort liability, e.g., moral and economic, are compared.
The student's grade is based on a single final examination.
Spring 2012
Saul Levmore
