“Uncommon Courses” is an irregular series from The Conversation US that presents unconventional teaching approaches.
Course title:
Poetry and Parks
How did the concept for the course come about?
I even have often found poetry to be strategy to teach law students the facility of specific details and the efficient elegance of compact language. At the University of Michigan Law School, where I’m a law professor, the school encouraged to carry informal “mini-seminars”“, which occur in locations outside of normal classrooms.
So I designed a poetry class that goes to different parks around campus. Each session lasts two hours and we meet every other week.
What does the course examine?
The course explores the various connections between law and poetry while giving students the chance to spend time in a few of Ann Arbor’s most inspiring places, including the favored 128-hectare Nichols Arboretum.
In one in every of the primary lessons, we give attention to the role that metaphors can play in advocacy, paying particular attention to the opening lines of the Somali-British poet. Warsan Shires “Home“, a poem that attempts to capture the experience of a refugee: “No one leaves home unless / their house is the mouth of a shark.”
Later within the semester, we use passages from Maya Angelou, Emily Dickinson, and WB Yeats to experiment with a variety of rhetorical techniques. Lawyers who’re good with words are an especially useful asset.
Why is that this course relevant now?
Lawyers are skilled writers in some ways. They are paid to write down sentences and paragraphs. If you will discover something that increases their appreciation for and aptitude for well-written language, you may improve their skills as lawyers and significantly increase their profession prospects.
In addition, regular trips into the fresh air can prevent burnout, which regularly occurs from long hours in lecture halls and libraries.
What is a crucial lesson from the course?
Word order could be just as necessary as word selection. The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she learned this lesson for the primary time when she studied at Cornell University. There she took courses in European literature with Vladimir Nabokov, who began his profession as a poet before he became a famous novelist.
My students now learn it by analyzing the poems of lots of Nabokov's contemporaries. Carl Sandburg, Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, Wallace Stevens, and EE Cummings all made the list.
What materials does the course contain?
Before each class, I send out a group of poems on a legal-related topic: education, transportation, having or losing a job.
I also give students the chance to suggest poems that they particularly like. Examples include:Famous” by Naomi Shihab Nye, “Sonnet VII“ by John Keats and “Aimless love“ by Billy Collins.
In my experience, the very best curricula are those created jointly by teachers and students.
What does the course prepare students for?
Through this course, students should see language – and their environment – in a brand new way. Students have also told me that the course has helped them improve their reading and writing skills, from contracts to grant proposals to appeals letters. Poetry can support many various types of persuasion.
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