Yale rising 2L taking questions Forum

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initialvacation

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Re: Yale rising 2L taking questions

Post by initialvacation » Mon Jul 29, 2013 3:38 am

thewaves wrote:This may be an odd question to try to answer, but how do humanities students enter into the "academic conversation" at YLS? I know Yale has a law and humanities journal, but it seems of more a side interest or focus (even an editor of the journal told me the field of law and literature is dead and kind of a joke). Just from your personal/anecdotal experience, how have your humanities friends developed interests beyond what they previously knew before entering YLS? I know no one has black and white academic/professional interests, but I have heard most people come to YLS with a certain expertise in a subject, some in more relevant legal areas (like Economics or Government).
I'm not totally sure what you mean by "humanities," but I'll try to share what information I think might be relevant. Most students at YLS, like at most law schools, I suspect, are humanities majors. Certain backgrounds, like political science, econ, and philosophy (all humanities, I would think) are more relevant for the law than others. That being said, the law is an entirely different field unto itself. Any background people have is not that relevant, and I'd say from a course material standpoint, everyone starts out on a roughly even playing field.

I would say most people, humanities majors or not, tend to find an interest in a field of law that they encounter in law school, such as constitutional, antitrust, international, immigration, clinical work, etc. Most people retain interests outside of the law as well; for English majors, maybe this includes like literature and poetry. But those interests are largely irrelevant to the law. Students often start or join self-directed reading groups for credit. You can plan your own curriculum. I'm not sure, but I think there are a few "law and literature" type reading groups.

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domino

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Re: Yale rising 2L taking questions

Post by domino » Mon Jul 29, 2013 1:08 pm

Thanks initialvacay!!

Is Comcast or AT&T better for internet service, or does it not matter?

initialvacation

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Re: Yale rising 2L taking questions

Post by initialvacation » Mon Jul 29, 2013 1:14 pm

domino wrote:Thanks initialvacay!!

Is Comcast or AT&T better for internet service, or does it not matter?
Had Comcast last year, it was okay. They have a special deal for the first six months which is pretty good. Haven't used AT&T. This year I get awesome 4G LTE on my phone at my new apartment, so I'm going to wireless tether it and not pay for internet. Hopefully this works out since Sprint is theoretically unlimited in data.

venier1988

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Re: Yale rising 2L taking questions

Post by venier1988 » Thu Oct 10, 2013 4:04 pm

Any chance you had Dan Kahan for Crim?

If so, can you give me advice on how to do well in his class?

Thanks.

bigbirdfly

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Re: Yale rising 2L taking questions

Post by bigbirdfly » Sat Oct 12, 2013 3:03 pm

initialvacation wrote:I am interested in appellate litigation and hopefully clerking on a federal CoA or (pipe dream) Supreme Court. I feel YLS is definitely the place to be if you want to pursue the clerkship/academia route (not sure about academia personally). I'm going to be in the Supreme Court clinic next year, which actually represents clients in front of the Supreme Court; the clinic just unfortunately lost the Baby Girl case this term. Hopefully doing that will give me a good sense of what appellate litigation is like and can help me gauge my continuing interest. Our Fall Interview Program (FIP) is coming up in August, and I will probably bid for NYC/DC firms that have an appellate practice. I don't want to limit myself too much so early though, and part of why I want to go to a big firm next summer is to experience a lot of different practice areas.

YLS is bizarrely high and low stress about FIP, as it is about so many other things. On the one hand, no one is stressed about getting a job, and it's kind of assumed that everyone will end up in biglaw unless they choose otherwise. On the other hand, the personalities here are the greatest concentration of neurotic/high-stress people I've ever been around so EVERYTHING is a crisis that needs to be managed. Even the relatively normal people can get caught up in that kind of atmosphere, so it's a little strange.

I wish I had known just a couple general "law school info"-type things before I started. Aka what is moot court/law review/mock trial? What is the difference between transactional and litigation practice? What does being a research assistant for a professor means? What is the timeline for the 1L/2L job search? Where should I live in law school? What is "black letter" vs other courses? Which courses are important for which career trajectories? Most of these answers are not Yale-specific so I won't bore you with my own personal experience unless you want to know about something specific, or if you're interested haha.
What are people stressed out about during FIP? Aren't everyone getting Wachtell/S&C/Cravath/W&C and other top NY/DC firms?

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