1.4 Know your subject matter

1.4.1 Knowing your subject and writing clearly about it are connected

Whenever you write in a particular role, to a particular person and for a particular purpose, you will also be writing about something. That is your subject matter. When you have a solid grasp of your subject matter, your next task is to write about that subject clearly and effectively. If you do not know what you are talking about, then clear writing will not help you, and bad writing will only exacerbate your problem.

There is, of course, a direct connection between understanding some subject matter and being able to write clearly about it: it is easier to write clearly about a topic if you are able to think clearly about it, and vice versa. So, the process of writing (and revising your writing) about a topic will very often help you develop your understanding of the subject matter, and, in turn, as your understanding deepens, your writing on that topic should also improve.

1.4.2 The importance of research

When you receive any writing task in law school, ask yourself:

What do I need to know about this subject matter in order to do the job?

Then ask:

What do I already know about it, and what do I need to find out?

The first question is about getting your bearings. The second question is all about research, which is an essential component of most writing tasks. Often you will find that, as you do the research, you do not know as much as you thought, or your focus needs to be on different things than what you originally thought. So, research is an ongoing, dynamic and evolving activity.

For some writing tasks, such research will be extensive. For other writing tasks, not much more may be needed than what you already know or what you have already covered in class. It will depend on the task. Exactly what research steps are needed in any particular case will vary. (This book is not a guide to how to conduct research in law school, but a few pointers are given in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.)