We began this practice in 2015 – the year after Michael Brown was killed in Ferguson, Missouri. Everywhere on campus, we were having difficult conversations and struggling to hear each other and to be heard in return. In the practice of law, it is important for attorneys to be exposed to and aware of aspects of the world beyond their own daily experiences. The American Bar Association reinforces this concept with its requirement of Standard 303 which highlights the importance of cross-cultural awareness and the obligation of attorneys to actively create an equitable justice system. To facilitate this understanding, and to strengthen our community at Hulston Hall, Mizzou Law started a One Read program. Law students, staff, and faculty are invited to read a particular book that relates to law, the legal profession, or legal education, and touches on important issues of the moment. We believe that a One Read program strengthens our community within Hulston Hall by providing a focus for conversations and events within the law school exploring the issues of race and the experience of “otherness.” There is no requirement that anyone agree with the concepts presented in any One Read book. Our goal is not conformity, but a challenging of the mind to learn more about law and its effect on people. We welcome respectful dissent and encourage thoughtful conversation.

Over the past few years, our One Read program has led us to read books that consider otherness from different vantage points. Our inaugural One Read opened our eyes to the justice offered to the marginalized and impoverished in Just Mercy by attorney Bryan Stevenson. Since then, we’ve considered the Japanese American internment experience in the United States during World War II, the effects of the “War on Drugs” and the resulting mass incarceration, and health care, power, and self-determination. More recently, we read Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance’s compassionate yet provocative account of poverty in Appalachia and his tumultuous childhood. We considered how to have hard conversations about race by reading Ijeoma Oluo’s best-seller, So You Want to Talk about Race, we explored life-long advocacy by reading Judy Heumann’s memoir Being Heumann detailing her fight for rights for the disabled community, and took a deep dive into the constitutional protections for religious freedom by reading Asma Uddin’s When Islam Is Not a Religion.