The damage done to us during our childhood cannot be undone, since we cannot change anything in our past. We can, however, change ourselves. We can repair ourselves and gain our lost integrity by choosing to look more closely at the knowledge that is stored inside our bodies and bringing this closer to our awareness. This path, although certainly not easy, is the only route by which we can leave behind the cruel, invisible prison of our childhood. We become free by transforming ourselves from unaware victims of the past into responsible individuals in the present, who are aware of our past and are thus able to live with it.1
We hope you were able to join us for “Dispossessing Detroit”! The JLR team was thrilled to host a wonderful day of engaging sessions and conversation.
Recordings of each talk can be found below. We hope you’ll re-watch your favorite parts and let these questions continue to challenge you!
Property Dispossession is Nothing New: A Historical Overview Panel discussion on the historical instances of land dispossession experienced by people living in the Detroit area and more broadly.
Beryl Satter, Professor of History, Rutgers University-Newark
Louise Seamster, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminology and African American Studies, University of Iowa
Michael Witgen, Director of the Native American Studies, Program and Associate Professor of History and American Culture, University of Michigan
Municipal Bankruptcy: Who Gets What? Panel discussion comparing the experiences of Detroit, Puerto Rico, and Harrisburg, PA and the citizens who call these places home during and after bankruptcy proceedings.
Ramifications of Dispossession: Activism and Lived Experiences A panel discussion addressing the ways dispossession has affected community members and activists.
Sonja Bonnet, Community Legal Worker, Detroit Justice Center
David Pitawanakwat, J.D. Candidate, University of Detroit Mercy School of Law and University of Windsor Faculty of Law
Simone Sagovac, Southwest Detroit Community Benefits Coalition
Revitalization Today: Urban Renewal and Eminent Domain Panel discussion on the role of revitalization efforts in cities throughout the country.
Ilya Somin, Professor of Law, George Mason University
Sean White, Director of Fund Development, Develop Detroit
Closing Remarks Small group discussions with speakers and participants discussing reforms to current issues of land dispossession. Small groups will reconvene to report possible reforms.
Hear from the Symposium team’s Nathan Santoscoy, Michigan Law student and Detroit native, about tax foreclosure crisis in Detroit and some of the conversations we’ll be having at our Symposium on Nov. 9:
Learn more about the Detroit story that will be our lens for conversation at “Dispossessing Detroit.”
Symposium: Saturday, Nov. 9, 2019 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. @ Michigan Law School
Hutchins Hall | 701 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Continental Breakfast and Check-In 8:00 – 8:30 AM | Main Floor Lobby, outside of Hutchins 100
Property Dispossession is Nothing New: A Historical Overview 8:30 – 9:30 AM Panel discussion on the historical instances of land dispossession experienced by people living in the Detroit area and more broadly.
Beryl Satter, Professor of History, Rutgers University-Newark
Louise Seamster, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminology and African American Studies, University of Iowa
Michael Witgen, Director of the Native American Studies, Program and Associate Professor of History and American Culture, University of Michigan
Municipal Bankruptcy: Who Gets What? 9:35 – 10:35 AM Panel discussion comparing the experiences of Detroit, Puerto Rico, and Harrisburg, PA and the citizens who call these places home during and after bankruptcy proceedings.
Juliet Moringiello, Associate Dean for Research and Faculty Development and Professor of Law, Widener University, Commonwealth Law School
John Pottow, John Philip Dawson Collegiate Professor of Law, University of Michigan Law School
David Skeel, S. Samuel Arsht Professor of Corporate Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School
Dispossession in Other Forms: A Closer Look at Detroit 10:45 – 12:15 PM Short presentations or conversations on various topics. Each conversation will be limited to 15-20 minutes with 5 minutes for audience questions and will be held three times over the course of an hour and a half.
Right of Refusal
10:45- 11:10 AM; 11:15- 11:40 AM; 11:45- 12:10 PM
Speakers: Michele Oberholtzer, Director of Tax Foreclosure Prevention, United Community Housing Coalition and Eli Savit, Senior Advisor to Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan
Changes in the Detroit Real Estate Market
10:45- 11:10 AM; 11:15- 11:40 AM; 11:45- 12:10 PM
Speaker: Joshua Akers, Assistant Professor of Geography and Urban & Regional Studies, University of Michigan-Dearborn
MorningSide v. Sabree: The Tax Foreclosure Crisis
10:45- 11:10 AM; 11:15- 11:40 AM; 11:45- 12:10 PM
Speaker: Michael Steinberg, Professor from Practice, University of Michigan Law School
How Data Informs Policy
10:45- 11:10 AM; 11:15- 11:40 AM; 11:45- 12:10 PM
Speaker: Jerry Paffendorf, Co-Founder & CEO, LOVELAND Technologies
Lunch 12:15 – 1:15 PM
Ramifications of Dispossession: Activism and Lived Experiences 1:15 PM – 2:15 PM A panel discussion addressing the ways dispossession has affected community members and activists.
Sonja Bonnet, Community Legal Worker, Detroit Justice Center
David Pitawanakwat, J.D. Candidate, University of Detroit Mercy School of Law and University of Windsor Faculty of Law
Simone Sagovac, Southwest Detroit Community Benefits Coalition
Revitalization Today: Urban Renewal and Eminent Domain 2:30 – 4:00 PM Panel discussion on the role of revitalization efforts in cities throughout the country.
Ilya Somin, Professor of Law, George Mason University
Sean White, Director of Fund Development, Develop Detroit
Dispossession Reform Round Tables 4:00 – 4:45 PM Small group discussions with speakers and participants discussing reforms to current issues of land dispossession. Small groups will reconvene to report possible reforms.
Closing Remarks 4:45 – 5:00 PM Small group discussions with speakers and participants discussing reforms to current issues of land dispossession. Small groups will reconvene to report possible reforms.
The Michigan Journal of Law Reform is pleased to announce that its 2017 Symposium, “Stemming the Breach: Cybersecurity Reform for the 21st Century,” will take place on February 11, 2017 in Michigan Law School’s South Hall, 625 South State St. Ann Arbor, MI.
The 2017 Symposium will run from approximately 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. and will feature the following panels and panelists:
Civil Liberties: featuring Marcy Wheeler, G.S. Hans, and Harley Geiger
Corporations: featuring Scott Shackelford, Ari Schwartz, and Alan Butler
National Security: featuring Harvey Rishikof, Cindy Cohn, and Ahmed Ghappour
The 2017 Symposium’s Key Note Address will be delivered by Former Congressman Mike Rogers
In this essay, I argue that law schools should continue to encourage and support wide-ranging legal scholarship, even if much of it does not seem to be of immediate use to the legal profession. I do not emphasize the relatively obvious point that scholarship is a process through which we study the law so that we can ultimately make useful contributions. Here, rather, I make two more-subtle points. First, legal academics ought to question the priorities of the legal profession, rather than merely take those priorities as given. We ought to serve as Socratic gadflies—challenging rather than merely mirroring regnant assumptions about what ought to matter in and to the law. Second, the freedom to serve this role is a large part of what attracts people capable of doing so to academic life. If we were to insist that legal scholars think about only those things that already matter to the legal profession, we would not attract the people we most need—people willing and able to help us rethink our assumptions about what ought to matter.
