Hi everybody!
Welcome to the Reblawg, the 2010 Rebellious Lawyering Conference's official blog. We are going to start posting regularly about all things RebLaw, and I hope you keep checking back to see what we're up to as the conference approaches!
As the weather gets colder, winter begins creeping up on the calendar, fireplaces turn on, turkeys are roasted and sleigh bells start ringing, we are all reminded of one thing: turning the legal world on its head through rebellious advocacy and activism! RebLaw 2010 is beginning to draw near, and, in preparation, our loyal team of seven directors (with a lot of help, obviously) has been putting together an amazing program. This year's conference is going to be better than ever, and we already have a diverse array of panels and workshops being finalized that are going to be incredible, featuring speakers from all over the U.S. and overseas. First things first: we have three (3) keynote speakers this year lined up and ready to go. On Friday, our speech will be delivered by public interest lawyer extraordinaire Bryan Stevenson, known for making his audience, and prosecutors, burst into tears, albeit for different reasons. On Saturday, we will have reknowned scholars, and two of America's premier critical race thinkers, Lani Guinier and Gerald Torres speaking together, which should be bad ass indeed. I recommend everyone check out their biographies on the RebLaw main page, or just google their names, to get stoked for the conference.
Registration will be available online in a number of days, and we highly encourage everybody to check as often as possible to see when panels and workshops have been put up, and to register as soon as you have a chance. We will be adding them to the site as they are finalized, which should be very soon. Our panel topics include juvenile justice in the USA and South Africa, mass incarceration and its effects on communities, clinical legal education in the Middle East, the challenges faced by LGBTQ prisoners, the future of ATCA litigation, state terrorism in Sri Lanka, the destructive effects of mountaintop removal, and more! Reblaw will also feature an array of how-to workshop sessions, career-building lunch talks, and a documentary film showing. I am also pleased to announce that RebLaw is growing its base, and this year will feature the first panel organized, planned and funded without any participation by Yale law students. To that effect I'd like to give a shout out to Gabe Armas and his sweet coalition of student groups at NYU, who are developing what should be a fantastic panel dealing with abuses of detainees at border detention facilities.
In addition to all this content, we will also be featuring, as always, free housing with local rebels, good food, and a chance to both network and party with your fellow progressives. We will be updating this blog on the reg to keep everyone up to date with the latest happenings, so keep checking back to find out what's going on, when registration starts, what our t-shirts are going to look like (slick new design coming soon!). We also will be bringing you informative submissions from Reblaw panelists to get you prepped for the panels.
We know travel can be expensive too, so we're going to find ways to connect you with fellow rebels to share the costs of travelling so that attending the conference can be cheap and easy (and have a smaller carbon footprint). A good place to start would be joining the Reblaw facebook group: just go on facebook and search for "Reblaw", it should be the first thing that comes up.
So get excited, keep checking back, and always remember to fight the power.
Peace,
Seth