Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Integrative Research Institute Law & Society (LSI)

Study Groups

The Socio-Legal Lab

The Socio-Legal Lab is a network for interdisciplinary legal research. Through workshops, summer schools and informal get-togethers, the Socio-Legal Lab, seeks to become a space that encourages both offline and online conversations among researchers and practitioners who are engaged in working at the interface of work on law and society.

 

Past events:

The kick-off workshop was held in 2018 and introduced students to general debates and approaches in socio-legal research (workshoph report here on https://barblog.hypotheses.org/2047). A follow-up workshop in 2019 covered questions of conducting, structuring and analyzing socio-legal data (workshop report here on https://barblog.hypotheses.org/2942). In 2021, we organized a Socio-Legal Lab as part of the workshop Navigation Interdisciplinarity together with Helen E. Hartnell, Lukas Huthmann, Lucie Kretschmer and Mortiz Schramm.

A more intensive exchange on different research designs (qualitative/quantitative methods) and challenges of methodology in action was possible at the four-day summer school in Göttingen which we held in 2019 and 2020 (online). A blog symposion hosted by Rechtswirklichkeit has emerged from this, in which students reflect upon their experiences (available here on https://barblog.hypotheses.org/3437).

 

A pedagogical approach:

The Socio-Legal Lab is not only a network but also aspires to be an open, non-hierarchical pedagogical space. In our workshops we aim to create a collaberative learning atmosphere by using a mixture of literature, visualisation and games in order to discuss and ideate about what it means to do socio-legal research. A book chapter on 'Socio-legal method labs as pedagogical spaces: experimentation, knowledge building, community development' is forthcoming in Amanda Perry-Kessaris and Emily Allbon (eds), Design in Legal Education.

 

Future & Contact:

We are planning to continue with regular events and workshops in the future. If you are interested in connecting with us, please contact Lisa Hahn (lisa.hahn@rewi.hu-berlin.de) and Siddharth de Souza (S.P.deSouza@tilburguniversity.edu)