Experts
Kenji Yoshino
Professor, NYU School of Law; Author
As part of Big Think's "How to Think Like Shakespeare" series, our panel discusses the most common misunderstandings and misapplications of Shakespeare. Read More
If you ask conservative and liberal judges whether George W. Bush is a war criminal for invading Iraq, you are unlikely to find agreement. But ask them about Henry V, and the tone of the debate shifts radically. Read More
Every years since 1994, the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington D.C. presents mock trials, often based on characters from Shakespeare's plays. On April 10 this year, Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Samuel Alito Jr. and Sonia Sotomayor presided over a trial involving characters from Oscar Wilde ... Read More
In Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway, the character Sheldon Flender poses the following existential question: "Let's say there was a burning building and you could rush in and you could save only one thing: either the last known copy of Shakespeare's plays or some anonymous human being. What ... Read More
James Shapiro, Carol Gilligan and guest editor Kenji Yoshino--a professor of English, a psychologist, and a law professor, respectively, discuss how plays like Antony and Cleopatra, Macbeth and Titus Andronicus speak to our contemporary ideas of love, leadership and revenge. ... Read More
Law professor Kenji Yoshino finds in Shakespeare the ideal body of work that is deep enough to sustain a conversation about justice in our society. Read More
In April, Big Think will be hosting a series titled “How to Think Like Shakespeare.” Like many of you, I grew up with a love of literature, and particularly of Shakespeare, that I set aside when I finished my liberal arts education. I went to law school because I took W.H. Auden’s dictum that ... Read More
What are the things I need to have a good life? Read More
Try seeing beyond your traditional affiliations. Read More
Depressed people have a better grasp of reality, Yoshino says. Read More
Circumscribing civil liberties is an irreversible process, Yoshino says. Read More
In a match-up against someone powerful, will justice be served? Read More
Its not an algorithm, says Yoshino. Read More
Opening up the text in a new way. Read More
Kenji Yoshino on group identity politics. Read More
Covering, Yoshino says, is downplaying aspects of an identity you otherwise admit to. Read More
The dichotomy between strict constructionists and those who advocate a living; Constitution is a false one, says Yoshino. Read More
Making homosexuality an issue of liberty, rather than equal protection. Read More
Yoshino is a political intellectual. Read More
About Kenji Yoshino
Kenji Yoshino is the Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Constitutional Law at the NYU School of Law. Prior to moving to NYU, he was the inaugural Guido Calabresi Professor of Law and Deputy Dean of Intellectual Life at Yale Law School, where he taught from 1998 to 2008. He received his undergraduate degree from Harvard College, took a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, and earned his law degree at Yale Law School. A specialist in constitutional law, antidiscrimination law, and law and literature, Yoshino has published in major academic journals, such as the Columbia Law Review, the Stanford Law Review, and the Yale Law Journal. He has also written extensively in other popular venues, such as The Boston Globe, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. He has appeared on "The O'Reilly Factor," "Washington Journal", and "The Tavis Smiley Show." His 2006 book, Covering: The Hidden Assault on Our Civil Rights, combines autobiography and legal scholarship and, as a result, it is "as healing as it is polemical," according to Publishers Weekly. He is currently working on a book on Shakespeare and the Law.