Assignments

 

What You Should Learn

In any doctrinal course, you should master the doctrines so that you can apply them to new facts. We’ll cover torts like assault, battery, false imprisonment, trespass, defamation, invasion of privacy, negligence, and infliction of emotional distress. You should also learn (1) how to read a case, such that you can identify the legal issues raised and the court’s resolution of them; (2) how to construct and evaluate legal arguments; and (3) how to present arguments persuasively.

 

First Assignment

For the first day, please read pages 4–8 in Tort Law: Cases & Critique and Taylor Swift, Philosopher of Forgiveness by Scott Hershovitz. I’d also strongly recommend reading Orin Kerr’s How to Read a Legal Opinion before diving into the cases.

Class Materials

We’ll use my casebook, Tort Law: Cases & Critique — a digital casebook I created especially for this class. Other materials are linked on the syllabus. I might occasionally assign other problems, readings, podcasts, or videos about current events. I’ll also recommend, but not insist, that you listen to Season 1 of the Dr. Death podcast, especially episodes 5, 6 & 7. (Note that the first episode and some middle episodes describe gory surgery details, especially episode 1 at 8:40–11:00.)

 

Grading

Your grade will reflect your performance on the final exam and your class participation. As things stand, my plan is to give you an open-book and open-notes exam with a word limit and a time limit. Please try not to spend the entire semester worrying about the exam. We’ll talk about it more when the time comes.

Other Materials

Feel free to use other materials you find helpful, but remember that you won’t be evaluated on those materials. Tort law is a sprawling subject, we won’t be covering everything, and you can learn everything you need to know for this course by completing the assignments and attending class. I’ve heard good things about Kenneth Abraham’s The Forms and Functions of Tort Law — which you can access online (for free!) through the UGA Law Library — but, again, this isn’t required.

 

Honor

All work done in this course is subject to UGA Law’s Honor Code and Plagiarism Policy, UGA’s Academic Honesty Policy, and UGA’s Non-Discrimination and Anti-Harassment Policy. Unless explicitly stated, AI-based technologies like ChatGPT mustn’t be used to generate responses for any assignments.

Questions? The best way to reach me is by email. To ensure you have my contact information, please email me by August 14 with a fun fact about yourself or something that interests you that has nothing to do with law school. Please also tell me anything else that you’d like me to know — your preferred name, your pronouns (mine are he/him/his), or anything else that’ll help me to help you learn.

All of the page ranges refer to our casebook, Tort Law: Cases & Critique (e.g., you should read pages 4–8 for our first class).

All supplemental readings are mandatory unless I mark them as “recommended.”

If you have trouble accessing any supplemental readings, please check my Law Library course reserves for PDFs.

The course syllabus is a general plan for the course; deviations announced by me may be necessary.

Week 1

Week 2

  • Mon: 16–25

  • Wed: 26–30

  • Thu: 31–35

Week 3

This week’s readings raise topics that might be distressing. We’ll discuss matters of sexual assault, domestic violence, racism, racial profiling, and violence against Black people by other citizens and police. I’ve included content warnings within the casebook, and I’ll also flag the supplemental materials by Franks, Coates, Taylor, and Williams.

Week 4

  • Mon: No class (Labor Day)

  • Wed: 50–55

  • Thu: 55–65

Week 5

Week 6

Week 7

  • Problem Day

  • Wed: 95–104

  • Thu: 105–11

Week 8

Week 9

Week 10

Week 11

  • Mon: 177–83

  • Wed: 184–87

  • Thu: 188–94

Week 12

Week 13

Week 14

  • Mon: 243–50

  • Wed: 251–63

    • Invisibilia, Emotions, NPR (2017) (recommended)

  • Thu: 263–72

Week 15

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