Areas of Expertise

About Lyrissa Lidsky

Lyrissa Lidsky is Dean of the University of Missouri School of Law and Judge C.A. Leedy Professor of Law, and the focus of her research and teaching is the intersection of Tort Law and the First Amendment, with an emphasis on free speech issues in social media. Missouri Lawyers Media named Lidsky its 2020 Woman of the Year based on her scholarship, passion for law, mentorship of students, and engagement of constituencies supporting the school of law.

Before becoming dean, Lidsky served in a variety of leadership roles at the University of Florida. There she was associate dean for graduate and international programs and associate dean for faculty development. She also held the Stephen C. O’Connell Chair in Law and received a number of teaching awards during her 23-year tenure at UF, including student-selected awards such as Teacher of the Year (twice) and Faculty Graduation Speaker (three times), as well as Teacher of the Year, which was selected by a faculty committee.

A prominent Media Law scholar, she is co-reporter on the Restatement of Defamation and Privacy, co-author of a leading Media Law casebook, a First Amendment casebook, and a reference book on press freedom and has published dozens of articles, culminating in her recent article in California Law Review titled Considering the Context of Online Threats. Her work on anonymous speech has been cited by a number of state supreme courts and the highest courts of Canada and Hong Kong.

Before becoming a law professor, Lidsky served as a clerk for the Honorable Joseph T. Sneed of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco, Calif. Lidsky received her law degree from the University of Texas School of Law with high honors. She was initiated into Order of the Coif in recognition of her scholastic achievement and served as articles editor of the Texas Law Review. Before law school, she was a Fulbright Scholar at Cambridge University in England, studying medieval legal history and early development of the Common Law. She received her bachelor’s degree, summa cum laude, in English and political science from Texas A&M University.

Latest News Featuring Lyrissa Lidsky

• Free Speech Panel with Dean Lidsky Carried on C-SPAN
• Dean Lidsky speaks about social media self-sabotage
• Dean Lyrissa Lidsky Leads Honorees for 2020 Women’s Justice Awards
• Dean Lidsky writes review of First Amendment article for JOTWELL
• Dean Lidsky speaks about free speech at Washington University lecture series

Latest Publications from Lyrissa Lidsky

• Within the Labyrinth of the Law, a Review of Robert C. Post and Jennifer E. Rothman’s, The First Amendment and the Rights of Publicity
• Review: The Social Foundation of Defamation Law
• Whither the Fourth Estate?
• # IU: Considering the Context of Online Threats
• OnionDNS: A Seizure-Resistant Top-Level Domain