Digital Legal History

Ryan Rowberry, Georgia State University College of Law, has published Legal History Through Digital Sources in volume 53 of the American Journal of Legal History (2013).

Anglo-American Legal History can be a very difficult subject to teach because of its scope. This article is a pedagogical piece discussing how I structure my Anglo-American Legal History seminar around the various digitized primary sources available to law students. During this seminar we examine the history of lawyers and judges from the late Anglo-Saxon period (tenth century) through the twentieth century, generally at the clip of one century per week. We do spend extra time, however, on the English Inns of Court and the rise of the American law school. The final two weeks of the semester are devoted to a series of student term paper presentations with accompanying feedback sessions. Term papers may deal with any topic, but the argument must be largely based on primary sources.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.