The Faculty Lounge

Iko Iko

Originally titled "Jock-a-Mo," the song now known as "Iko Iko" was written and released by Chess Records' Checker subsidiary in 1953 by James "Sugar Boy" Crawford. It tells the story of competition between two bands of Mardi Gras parade "Indians." The lyrics are just random chants -- as Crawford explained in an interview -- although some have tried to impute meaning to them. Crawford's record didn't chart, but the Dixie Cups had a hit with an a cappella version in 1965. One of them had evidently only heard her grandmother singing it and, unaware of Crawford's release, and believing it to be a traditional song, claimed the copyright. (Evidence, btw, that such copyright claims were common at the time, and not only by Pete Seeger.) Litigation followed, with Crawford mostly prevailing. 

"Iko Iko" has since become closely identified with New Orleans, though many of the numerous covers have been by non-NOLA artists.

Hiring Announcement: Loyola University New Orleans College of Law

From a recent email message:

Professor/Associate Professor/Assistant Professor

Loyola University New Orleans College of Law is now accepting applications for two tenure-track or tenured positions to begin August 1, 2025. Loyola’s curricular needs include business law, criminal law, environmental law, health law, intellectual property law, international law, law & technology courses, and tort law. If you are interested in applying, please submit a curriculum vitae and cover letter. All ranks will be considered. Application materials must be submitted through the following webpage: https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/loyno/jobs/4003800/tenure-track-tenured-law-faculty

Civil Law Professor

Loyola University New Orleans College of Law is now accepting applications for a tenure-track or tenured position to begin August 1, 2025. Loyola is seeking an internationally-trained civilian with a background in comparative private law who will teach Louisiana Civil Code courses. If you are interested in applying, please submit a curriculum vitae and cover letter. All ranks will be considered. Application materials must be submitted through the following webpage: https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/loyno/jobs/4383204/civil-law-faculty

About the College of Law

The College of Law is located in one of the most culturally diverse cities in the United States, with unique cuisine, museums, historical sites, and a flourishing arts and music community.  New Orleans is the seat of the United States Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, Louisiana Supreme Court, Louisiana Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal, as well as other lower courts.  The College of Law has a student population of approximately 500 students, over forty faculty members, active clinics that have spearheaded numerous social justice reform efforts, and summer abroad programs.  Its location in Louisiana, one of the world’s best known “mixed jurisdictions,” provides unique opportunities for comparative and international law scholarship.

Loyola University is an educational institution dedicated to fostering intellectual achievement, personal development, and social responsibility, and it is committed to the human dignity and worth of every person.

CFP: Re-Imagining Trans in Contemporary South Asia: Moving With, Against, and Beyond the State (Transgender Studies Quarterly, Duke University Press)

Deadline for submissions: August 15, 2024

 

Guest Editors: Claire Pamment and Jeffrey A. Redding 

 

For over a decade now, trans activism and trans representation has accelerated in social, legal, political, cultural, and artistic realms across South Asia. While these movements have animated possibilities for trans lives and trans justice, so too have they often perpetuated narrow modes of legitimacy, reproducing hierarchies around gender, class, caste, language, religion, kinship, labor, sexuality, nation, and global capital. Violence against khwaja sira-hijra-kothi-trans persons is rampant, surveillance and policing have ensued, and legislative achievements have been tenuous at best. For example, in 2023, Pakistan’s groundbreaking Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act from 2018 was deemed largely “unIslamic” and unenforceable by Pakistan’s Federal Shariat Court writing in global anti-gender registers, and India’s 2019 Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act has mobilized a range of dissent across political, legal, civil, and activist spaces. This special issue invites inquiry into the accelerations and disruptions to trans movements alongside feminist, anti-caste, labor, LGBTQI+ and other mobilizations not only in the contemporary moment but also situating these movements—their histories and genealogies—in and across the changing borders of South Asia.

 

We build upon a robust body of scholarship that complicates a linear view of state recognition and rights, rather than rendering them as uniformly progressive or as failures, and seeing them as mediated by a host of factors: globalization, NGOization, regional relations and the active participation of khwaja sira-hijra-kothi-trans persons (Dutta 2012, Hossain 2021, Jain and DasGupta 2021, Reddy 2006, Roy 2022). At a moment of further upheavals—neoliberal and/or religious nationalisms, fractured international rights regimes, and democratic populism—we invite re-imaginings of trans in South Asia. We encourage contributions which think alongside queer and trans South Asian scholarship that challenges methodological nationalisms and dominant registers of legality and epidemiology, unsettles the logics of historical recuperation (Arondekar 2023), advances transregional analysis (Chiang 2021), couples aesthetics and politics (Gopinath 2018; Horton 2020; Hossain, Pamment, and Roy 2023; Kapadia 2019; Khubchandani 2020; Pamment and Roy 2023), or questions the subsumption into dominant Western theorizations of rights, identities, and representation.

 

We invite multidisciplinary contributions that foreground imaginative worlds of trans possibility in and across South Asia, including (but not limited to) the following themes:

13th Annual Promoting Diversity in Law School Leadership

Interested in law school leadership? The 13th Annual Promoting Diversity in Law School Leadership, co-hosted by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law and Seattle University School of Law,  is designed to encourage and assist members of underrepresented groups to pursue deanships and other leadership positions. The workshop will help participants: determine whether to pursue a deanship and the right time; understand the nuts and bolts of the dean's role; prepare to be a successful candidate; learn how to negotiate appointment terms and ensure a successful transition; and, determine what other forms of university and law school leadership roles may be a good fit.

Experience shows this will be an excellent program, and it has been a launching pad for a number of sitting deans and associate deans. This year's workshop will be held September 20-21, 2024 at Villanova University. Details and registration link are here.

 

Hiring Announcement: University of Oklahoma College of Law

From a recent email message:

The College of Law at the University of Oklahoma (OU Law) seeks outstanding applicants, entry-level or lateral, for up to three full-time tenure/tenure-track positions to begin in the Fall Semester of 2025, at the rank of Associate Professor or Professor.  OU Law welcomes applicants in all subject areas but has particular interest in filling curricular needs in Bankruptcy, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law (principally upper-division electives), and Family Law. 

OU Law’s strong national reputation is buttressed by a commitment to attracting and supporting excellent faculty with summer research grants, publication placement bonuses, course reductions based on scholarly productivity, and an extraordinary number of endowed positions. 

OU Law is a high-quality, affordable, and forward-looking institution committed to developing a socially involved legal profession. OU Law boasts world-class facilities, a commitment to technological innovation, and a varied student body. 

OU Law sits on the university’s main campus in Norman, a college town alive with entertainment, arts, food, and sports. A perennial “best place to live,” Norman has excellent public schools and low cost-of-living.  Neighboring Oklahoma City features a dynamic economy, outstanding cultural venues, and a major airport. For additional information regarding the university, Norman, and Oklahoma City, visit: 

https://www.ou.edu/facultyrecruitment    

https://www.visitnorman.com/    

https://www.visitokc.com/

 

Hiring Announcement: Faulkner University Thomas Goode Jones School of Law

From a recent email message:

Faulkner University Thomas Goode Jones School of Law seeks well-qualified applicants to fill a clinical faculty position overseeing the school's Generational and Ancestral Property (GAP) Clinic beginning June 1, 2025. The successful candidate will have practical experience and academic interest in heirs property. Candidates must possess a strong academic background and an equally strong potential for teaching excellence and service. Materials should be submitted online here. Questions may be addressed to Professor Melvin L. Otey at [email protected].

Faulkner University's Thomas Goode Jones School of Law (Montgomery, AL) invites applications for a full-time Legal Research and Writing Faculty position beginning August 1, 2025. The successful candidate must possess a strong academic background, effective communication skills, and a potential for teaching excellence. Materials should be submitted online here. Questions may be addressed to Professor Melvin L. Otey at [email protected].

ALI Elects New Members

The American Law Institute has announced (here) the election of new members. Among them are these law professors:

• Laura I. Appleman, Willamette University College of Law
• D. Benjamin Barros, Stetson University College of Law
• Tiffany Williams Brewer, Howard University School of Law
• Daniel C.K. Chow, The Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law
• Erin F. Delaney, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
• Mihailis E. Diamantis, University of Iowa College of Law
• Matthew Diller, Fordham University School of Law
• Gabriel Eckstein, Texas A&M University School of Law
• Nicole Stelle Garnett, Notre Dame Law School
• Margaret Hagan, Stanford Law School
• Vinay Harpalani, University of New Mexico School of Law
• Justin Levitt, Loyola Law School, Los Angeles
• Veronica Root Martinez, Duke University School of Law
• Christopher L. Peterson, University of Utah, S.J. Quinney College of Law
• Richard E. Redding, Chapman University, Dale E. Fowler School of Law
• Carolyn Shapiro, IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law
• Kate A. Shaw, University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law
• Brian Soucek, University of California, Davis School of Law

Congratulations to all!

Angela Upchurch Named Interim Dean of Southern Illinois Law

Associate Dean Angela Upchurch  has been named interim dean of Southern Illinois University School of Law effective July 1. Upchurch joined the law school in 2014 and holds a JD from Loyola University Chicago School of Law.