International legal experts to teach Summer Law Schools

Southern Cross University will host two internationally renowned legal experts for two Summer Law School sessions at the Gold Coast campus in January 2017.

Jay Gary Finkelstein has practised corporate and securities law for more than 30 years from the US and internationally, and will share his experience with the students in the Current Issues in International Law (International Business Negotiations) subject running from January 9 – 12, with registration closing January 3.

Slovene philosopher, sociologist, legal theorist and internationally renowned author Professor Renata Salecl will teach the subject Psychiatry, Psychology and the Law from January 22 – 25, with registration closing January 13.

Southern Cross University’s Head of the School of Law and Justice Professor William MacNeil said the intensive summer workshops were unrivalled in Australia.

“The difference to our Gold Coast Summer Law School this year is having two outstanding, internationally-recognised legal figures teaching these courses,” he said.

“Professor Salecl is one of the stars of global criminology, legal theory, and cultural legal studies and holds appointments at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, at London University and at Cardozo Law School in New York,” he said.

“She has written a string of fantastic books and is a feminist and psycho-analytic scholar examining issues as diverse as crime, violence, transgression, anxiety and choice through the lens of critical theory, especially that of Freud, Foucault and Lacan.

“She’s quite witty and personable - as is Jay Finkelstein; they are both very likable people.

“I knew they’d be student-friendly, not the forbidding type of public intellectuals.”

Professor MacNeil said he and Jay Finkelstein met in Israel when both were teaching sessions there in March 2015.

“We would be very hard-pressed to find someone else of Jay Finelstein’s stature to guest lecture a subject; he’s a Washington attorney who is also a member of the adjunct faculties at Stanford, Berkeley and Georgetown law schools,” Professor MacNeil said.

“It is great he is coming to Australia for a week to share his wealth of experience and knowledge with students and industry professionals who want to take part.”

Professor MacNeil said the niche subjects would be ideal for students, lawyers, industry professionals, senior administrators and anyone requiring knowledge and understanding from the units on offer.

Each intensive Summer Law School runs for one week and equates to one session of study. Participants can take part in both sessions, with cross-institutional, non-award and international students welcome.

“The benefit for students is this would really set their transcript and CV apart to have a session like this on it, taught by such distinguished scholars who are internationally recognised experts in their field,” he said.

LAW72007 Current Issues in International Law (International Business Negotiations) will run from January 9 - 12 January 2017 with Jay Gary Finkelstein and will provide an introduction to negotiations and transactional legal practice where students will be actively involved in an international business negotiation simulation through written exchanges and live negotiations. Registration closes January 3.

LAW10207 Psychiatry, Psychology and the Law will run from 22 January - 25 January 201 with Professor Renata Salecl will provides students with an overview of the way law and judicial systems affect the psychic life of the individual – be it in the position of a lawyer or a person who is in a variety of ways affected by the legal machinery in daily private and public life. Registration closes January 13.

Legal practitioners who complete these units may be eligible for MCLE/CLE points.


Photo: Professor Renata Salecl