Stealing Culture: Law Students Engage an Interdisciplinary Analysis Through the Museum

Abstract

Museums can be foundational locations for training law students to become lawyers. However, unlike other professions where the museum is intertwined with the profession, for example, a medical museum or anthropological museum, here, there is no ‘legal museum.’ Instead, law students are using the whole museum to develop the litany of desirable skills required to become a successful lawyer. Because the museum does not exist ‘for lawyers,’ the students are engaging with the museum, its functions and its contents, as a learning lab and a primary source. Thus, the museum is not built to accommodate the students. Instead, the students are learning by entering into the museum and all that is involved in its operation. This chapter is our journey through theoretical conceptualization of this undeveloped learning environment to implementation, over a variety of class sizes and structures. Between domestic and international, we have been fortunate to teach a cohort of students, on average, once an academic year. Through praxis (our implementation and engagement, assessment, evaluation, theorization, and re-engagement), we have honed techniques that allow law students to interact with the museum in ways that benefit their personal and professional growth.