Don't Make Me Shove My Footnote Up Your Ass

Ah, remember the days of college writing? You would get to the bibliography, and it was gravy from there. I mean, who really cared about following those rules of MLA and APA? You might slap some stuff on a page, and call it a day. As long as the information was there, was it really important how? That was my attitude at least.

Well, those days are gone. Long gone. Welcome to the world of The Bluebook. For those non-law students, allow me to clue you in. This is a book of citation, put out by the Harvard Law Review, governing every rule for citation. And I mean every. Need to know the official abbreviation for "Communication"? (Who knew it was "Commc'n"?) Need to know when to use "See" "E.g." "Cf." "But see" or "Compare"? Oh, there are rules aplenty. A veritable cornucopia.

So who on Earth cares about this? Me, that's who. And not because I feel some personal attachment to it (Although, I am anal-retentive, I admit). Rather, I have to care about it. Why? I'm a sub-citer. One of the nameless, faceless drones that works on a law journal, checking the footnotes, making sure that they are properly cited, checking the sources to make sure it's an accurate representation, and making other contributions to articles (additional research, general comments). What exactly is the purpose of this? Most law schools don't let 1Ls work as sub-citing, but not Harvard. Perhaps the 2Ls just don't want to, so they pass it on to us naive, unsuspecting types. But whatever the motivation, or however useless it might appear, I think it actually might be beneficial. It's good practice. Sure, it's secretarial work, but I think attention to detail is a hallmark of professionalism (again, need I point you to my anal-retentive nature?). In my search for sources, I am actually learning. Sure, these aren't the BIG lawyering skills, but it's the little things. The polish. The experience. Could be I've just been brainwashed by the system. But I think it's something else. After all, I kind of enjoy it. And if you think I would have to be crazy to enjoy some kind of mind-numbing, repetitive, pencil-pushing, menial task, that requires hours of my time in the library, all for the unattainable goal of "perfection," well, then we haven't met.