Learning from Laurie Edelman

Abstract

Faculty members, students, policymakers, practitioners, and laypersons will learn from Laurie Edelman's brilliant scholarship for generations to come. She developed not only a new theory and a conceptual vocabulary for understanding the interplay of law and organizations-think, "legal endogeneity," "managerialization of law," or "symbolic structures" (Edelman, 2016)-but also a more precise account of the mutual influence between law and society. In this essay, we hold her scholarly contributions aside for a moment to explore what the three of us learned from Laurie in two of her most cherished professional roles as mentor and research collaborator. In many ways, she seemed happiest in these roles, whether advising students and early-career faculty (especially those most likely to be marginalized in academic circles, such as persons identifying as women and/or LGBTQ+, persons of color, persons with disabilities, or firstgeneration scholars) or working with scholars of diverse expertise and statuses on large, empirical projects.Catherine "KT" Albiston and Osagie Obasogie wrote the first two parts of this essay, respectively, "Learning the Hidden Curriculum from Laurie" and "Walking with Laurie," which explore what they learned from Laurie as a mentor. Laurie advised both as doctoral students at UC Berkeley: KT in the Jurisprudence and Social Policy (JSP) program and Osagie in the Department of Sociology. KT also collaborated with Laurie and multiple colleagues on the award-winning "Judicial Deference Project" (e.g., Edelman et al., 2011). Calvin "Cal" Morrill wrote the third part of this essay, "Learning Research Collaboration from Laurie." In this part of the essay, he explores what he learned from collaborating with Laurie on multiple, long-term empirical projects, especially the award-winning "School Rights Project" (e.g.,