Reading Like A Lawyer: Time-Saving Strategies For Reading Law Like An Expert [Paperback]

Ruth Ann McKinney (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1594600325 | ISBN-13: 978-1594600326 | Publication Date: April 22, 2005

The ability to read law well is a critical, indispensable skill that can make or break the academic career of any aspiring lawyer. Fortunately, the ability to read law well (quickly and accurately) is a skill that can be acquired through knowledge and practice. The sooner the student masters these skills, the greater the rewards. Using seven specific reading strategies, reinforced with hands-on exercises at the end of each chapter, this book shows students how they can read law efficiently, effectively, powerfully, and confidently. Reading Like a Lawyer is divided into 3 parts: * Part I introduces the reader to the fundamentals of legal reasoning upon which law-based reading builds; * Part II introduces the reader to concrete strategies for reading effectively in law school; * and Part III teaches strategies for reading law outside of the law school context.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The author is an excellent writer and has produced a book suitable for introducing legal writing and reasoning in a variety of settings." --Bimonthly Review of Law Books

About the Author

Ruth McKinney is a professor of law at University of North Carolina School of Law.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 285 pages
• Publisher: Carolina Academic Press (April 22, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594600325
• ISBN-13: 978-1594600326
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 7.9 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #107,438 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #22 in Books > Law > Law Practice > Research
  • #88 in Books > Law > Legal Education

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mandatory Reading For Law Students -- Critical Reading Curriculum Instructor, Phillip G. Hubbard Law School Preparation Program, July 20, 2007

By 

Dr. Ervin Nieves - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Reading Like A Lawyer: Time-Saving Strategies For Reading Law Like An Expert (Paperback)

When I was asked to teach the "critical reading curriculum" at The University of Iowa's Phillip G. Hubbard Law School Preparation Program, I researched methodically to find a text that would be "on point" as they say in the legal world. Ruth Ann McKinney's Reading Like A Lawyer is just that. Written in an engaging and easy to read style, McKinney teaches prospective and current law students all the skills necessary to successfully understand a variety of legal documents. These skills include learning to brief a law case and analyze casebook law, learning how to decipher the complexities of analyzing statutes, and discovering how to read legal cases outside a law classroom's casebook. The strength of McKinney's text is that she provides you with real edited casebook cases, real-world statutes, and real non-casebook (i.e. unedited) cases, ready for the reader to read first-hand. McKinney then supplies the student with a list of questions to help them hone valuable legal reading skills. After a student finishes learning how to read a case, and then reads it, a highlighted and annotated version of the same legal case appears, wherein McKinney demonstrates the areas in the case that are important and should have been identified as important by the reader. Reading these annotated cases is akin to entering the mind of an experienced high level attorney as s/he reads and analyzes a case. When I brought McKinney's Reading Like A Lawyer to the attention of the Dean of Students at The University of Iowa's School of Law, Dean R. Chayce Ramey, I was delighted to learn that he often recommends McKinney's text to law students, and that he himself refers to it when teaching legal skills. I was surprised to see so few reviews of McKinney's text, and I suspect part of the reason is that this is one book many competitive law students would like to keep a secret. Well, the secret's out of the bag -- McKinney's book is an outstanding must read for all prospective and current law students!

Dr. Ervin Nieves
Critical Reading Instructor,
Phillip G. Hubbard Law School Preparation Program
The University of Iowa

23 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars OK, but certainly not "Phenomenal", February 6, 2008

By 

Steven J. Richardson (Ann Arbor, MI United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Reading Like A Lawyer: Time-Saving Strategies For Reading Law Like An Expert (Paperback)

If you are already a good reader, then this book probably won't help you much. There are some basic tips which help to orient beginners to some of the lingo, style, and format of (particularly) legal opinions...which are OK but something which isn't surprising/new/presented in an amazing fashion.

The heart of the book appears to be getting people who are poor or so-so readers to realize that reading is *the* primary tool used by law school students and good lawyers, and gives prescriptions for trying to make you a more engaged readers. McKinney teaches at a law school, and so can be said to "have done well for herself," so her ideas may be helpful...but if you're already a good reader, you already are engaged, etc. Her emphasis on being an active reader may be just what you are already doing; it seems to be (again!) directed towards readers who are not careful to actually understand what they read, who gloss over words/phrases they don't know, who don't "get" the importance of transitional phrases which clue the reader in to important clarifications, qualifications, etc.

She has some exercises which may or may not be helpful, too, to try to stimulate you to use her system of reading.

Besides pushing a more active reading, McKinney has an emphasis on being generally involved in one's law school education; part of what is said is to go ahead and make provisional assumptions/hypotheses/guesses about what is going on, being willing to update them in the light of new information, etc. Though she is supposedly helping you to use your time better, some of it is a bit overboard and certainly extra work for very little bang: for example, she wants you to guess and write down what some brief will be about, rather than just reading it and finding out...

Also, she seems to think that she has discovered something amazing when she asks readers to visualize, e.g., the facts of the case; she puts a huge emphasis on bringing one's own experiences to the task of reading, apparently in an attempt to get people more motivated/invested in what they are doing. If McKinney had taken the time to understand the current theory of ways that we learn--visual, aural, tactile--then she would have presented this better and also with a little more humility. She is a visual learner, apparently, so this method worked for her; you should use what works for you.

Her "method" uses an acronym which has to work too hard. Several letters stand for more than one word/idea, and "E.M.P.O.W.E.R." is just too much like people writing down "knowledge is power" without actually working to have the knowledge.

As you might have gleaned from the above, one of her unspoken goals appears to be just encouraging law school students to "hang in there," that they *will* "get it" if they apply themselves, and not to be afraid of having an opinion which might not conform to what others think, etc. In short, ask lots of questions, read actively, participate a lot, and you'll get more out of being a student.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Only for 1Ls, July 12, 2009

By 

Lemuel Garcia - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Reading Like A Lawyer: Time-Saving Strategies For Reading Law Like An Expert (Paperback)

If you've already finished your first year of law school (and performed well) this book is unnecessary to read. If you are an incoming 1L and are looking for a book to get you acquainted with what to expect in law school this book will help you. It is a good read for anybody coming into law school. It will help you succeed in your first year and your entire law education.