Grounded in Critical Race Theory (CRT), Black Men in Law School refutes the claim that when African American law students are "mismatched" with more selective law schools, the result is lower levels of achievement and success. Presenting personal narratives and counter-stories, Jackson demonstrates the inadequacy of the mismatch theory and deconstructs the ways race is constructed within American public law schools. Calling for a replacement to mismatch theory, Jackson offers an alternative theory that considers marginalized student perspectives and crystallizes the nuances and impact that historically exclusionary institutions and systems have on African American law school students. To further the debate on affirmative action, this book shows that experiences and voices of African American law school students are a crucial ingredient in the debate on race and how it functions in law schools.

Profiles African American lawyers during the era of segregation and the civil rights movement, with an emphasis on the conflicts they felt between their identities as African Americans and their professional identities as lawyers.

The reflections on their lives in law of pioneer black women lawyers

This book relates the fortuitous discovery of a significant historical figure: George Washington Fields (1854-1932). Fields was known to have entered with the first law class of Cornell University and earned his LL.B. degree there in 1890. But his back story before college was unknown, and hence the significance of his life after graduation was unappreciated. It turns out, although the university's records were previously silent on this, that Fields not only was the new law school's first African-American graduate, but also was in the first graduating group of African Americans from Cornell University as a whole. Even more distinctively, he was the only ex-slave ever to graduate from that august university. Fields' significance is not so locally confined, however. Born into slavery in Hanover County, Virginia, he started at the bottom. But he, along with his remarkable family, made a historic escape to Hampton at the height of the Civil War. He next worked to support the family, and still pursued an education at the storied Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute. Later going North, he worked for nearly a decade, including stints as manservant for various luminaries, before completing his legal studies. He then went home to Hampton where——though blinded in 1896——he continued to overcome, eventually becoming a leading attorney of the region. Most important, in his later years, he wrote an autobiography. This book presents in full form that hitherto unpublished work, rediscovered in the archives of a Hampton museum. The autobiography ranks as a major slave narrative. It is an incredible document, telling a riveting tale of escape and triumph, while conveying a sense of this great and greatly likeable person. He recounts his story with a special blend of humor and wisdom, laying out in no uncertain terms the set of values that guided him through his fascinating times. Before and after that autobiographical centerpiece, the other parts of this book provide context and fill gaps in the five-act life story: the wrenching antebellum life of a slave family, the dramatic escape during wartime, the rebuilding of family life during the South's Reconstruction, the necessary move up to the North for more work and schooling, and finally the return to Hampton for a largely happy and very productive life. The resulting book has potential for use by history, Africana, and law students, and should have appeal for Civil War and Virginia history buffs. Yet it is, if nothing else, a great read for just about anyone.

You Don't Look Like a Lawyer: Black Women and Systemic Gendered Racism highlights how race and gender create barriers to recruitment, professional development, and advancement to partnership for black women in elite corporate law firms. Utilizing narratives of black female lawyers, this book offers a blend of accessible theory to benefit any reader willing to learn about the underlying challenges that lead to their high attrition rates. Drawing from narratives of black female lawyers, their experiences center around gendered racism and are embedded within institutional practices at the hands of predominantly white men. In particular, the book covers topics such as appearance, white narratives of affirmative action, differences and similarities with white women and black men, exclusion from social and professional networking opportunities and lack of mentors, sponsors and substantive training. This book highlights the often-hidden mechanisms elite law firms utilize to perpetuate and maintain a dominant white male system. Weaving the narratives with a critical race analysis and accessible writing, the reader is exposed to this exclusive elite environment, demonstrating the rawness and reality of black women’s experiences in white spaces. Finally, we get to hear the voices of black female lawyers as they tell their stories and perspectives on working in a highly competitive, racialized and gendered environment, and the impact it has on their advancement and beyond.

As the magazine of the Texas Exes, The Alcalde has united alumni and friends of The University of Texas at Austin for nearly 100 years. The Alcalde serves as an intellectual crossroads where UT's luminaries - artists, engineers, executives, musicians, attorneys, journalists, lawmakers, and professors among them - meet bimonthly to exchange ideas. Its pages also offer a place for Texas Exes to swap stories and share memories of Austin and their alma mater. The magazine's unique name is Spanish for "mayor" or "chief magistrate"; the nickname of the governor who signed UT into existence was "The Old Alcalde."

"Emancipation is an important and impressive work; one cannot read it without being inspired by the legal acumen, creativity, and resiliency these pioneer lawyers displayed. . . . It should be read by everyone interested in understanding the road African-Americans have traveled and the challenges that lie ahead."—From the Foreword, by Justice Thurgood Marshall