Daily Read: Radice on Bell on ConLaw Pedagogy

Need some midweek teaching inspiration? 

Professor Joy Radice shares her observations of the conlaw teaching of the late Derrick Bell (pictured): "Bell’s classroom community was a safe space to learn constitutional law, to discuss difficult but related issues of race, class, and gender, and to take risks when thinking about legal strategies."

Radice's terrific brief essay, "Derrick Bell’s Community-Based Classroom,” is part of the wonderful collection of essays from the conference last year, now available in Columbia Journal of Race and Law:

• “The Post Racial Era: Race, Silence, the Denial of Race/Racism and Optimism,” –Leonard Baynes, St. John’s University School of Law
•  “Notes Toward a Critical Contemplation of the Law,” –Sonia Katyal, Fordham University School of Law
• “Derrick Bell’s ‘Afrolantica’ and Gentrification in Harlem,” –Twila Perry, Rutgers University School of Law
• “How Derrick Bell Helped Me Decide to Become an Educator, Not Just a Faculty Member,” –Vanessa Merton, Pace University School of Law
• “Derrick Bell’s Community-Based Classroom,” –Joy Radice, University of Tennessee College of Law
• “ ‘A Living Working Faith’: Remembering Our Colleague Derrick A. Bell, Jr. as Teacher,” –Andrea McArdle, CUNY School of Law
• “A Legacy of Teaching,” –Robin Lenhardt, Fordham University School of Law
• “Derrick Bell’s Children,” –I. Bennett Capers, Brooklyn Law School
• “From Interest Convergence to Solidarity,” –Julie Suk, Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University
• “A Multiplicity of Interests,” –Rachel Godsil, Seton Hall University School of Law
• “Racial Fortuity, Rights Sacrifice, and the Promise of Convergence in Prison and Policing Policy,” –Taja-Nia Henderson, Rutgers School of Law – Newark

Each one of these essays is worth a read.

RR