By Liz Keogh
Dealing with client’s emotions (and your own emotional reactions to your clients’ behaviour) is a central part of all areas of legal practice, but nowhere more so than in family law.
Yet learning about emotion is almost completely absent from legal education. At ANU Legal Workshop we’re doing something about that.
In the Family Law Practice elective, which forms part of the Admission to Practice qualification, we have an explicit, and substantial focus, on learning about emotion.
During the course you will interact with three emotionally complex clients. You won’t be doing it alone though, as the course convener will be coaching and supporting you as you go.
You will be prompted to think, all along the way, about the emotions your clients are experiencing, and the emotional reactions you are having to your client’s behaviour. At the end of the course you will wrap up all that thinking in a reflective discussion where you share some of your thoughts with your peers and hear how they have reacted to the same experiences.
It’s amazing how much you will learn from hearing about the similarities and differences in other people’s thoughts and feelings.
At the same time as you’re doing all this thinking about emotion you’ll also be learning how to draft orders and affidavits and advocate for a client in the Family Law Courts. Just like in practice – the technical work will be completely interwoven with the human dimension of family law work.
At the end of the course you’ll have a much clearer idea of whether Family Law is the right field for you. And you’ll have a bunch of new skills you can put to good use, whatever area of law you choose to work in.
It’s about bringing the human element back into the practice of law.
Elizabeth (Liz) Keogh convenes the Family Law Practice elective in the ANU Legal Workshop’s Master of Legal Practice program. Before joining the ANU, Liz worked as a lawyer in private practice, the Commonwealth public service and as a law reform advocate.
