Sue Provenzano
Assistant Professor- Education
J.D., University of Wisconsin Law School
B.A., University of Wisconsin-Madison
- Specializations
Civil Procedure
Evidence
Federal Courts
- Biography
Sue Provenzano, assistant professor of law, joined the Georgia State University College of Law faculty in fall 2022. Before coming to Georgia State, she was a professor of practice at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law in Chicago, teaching civil procedure, evidence, employment discrimination, and employment law. Professor Provenzano is the grateful recipient of numerous teaching awards, including Northwestern Law’s highest teaching honor, the Robert Childres Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence.
Professor Provenzano’s research applies philosophical, linguistic, and rhetorical theories of meaning across the law in pursuit of what she terms “unsolved interpretive mysteries.” Her work has appeared in the Indiana Law Journal, the Tennessee Law Review, and the Nevada Law Journal, as well as in Northwestern Law Review’s online companion. Professor Provenzano has contributed to multiple university press volumes and speaks on the topics of civil procedure, law and rhetoric, and legal education.
Both before and during her life as an academic, Professor Provenzano has enjoyed writing United States Supreme Court merits briefs, amicus briefs, and petitions for certiorari. She has tackled interpretive issues involving the insanity defense, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the False Claims Act, and the Copyright Act.
Before she entered law teaching, Professor Provenzano practiced civil litigation at the Chicago law firms of Kirkland & Ellis, Mayer Brown, and Franczek Radelet. She also clerked for the Honorable Ruben Castillo, former Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Professor Provenzano graduated with honors from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where she served as the editor-in-chief of the Wisconsin Law Review.
- Publications
Articles
How Rhetoric Reveals Judicial Motives in Employment Discrimination Cases, 90 Tenn. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming fall 2022).
Worker Classification Conundrums in the Gig Economy, __ Pacific L. Rev. __ (forthcoming fall 2022) (invited/symposium contribution).
Can Speech Act Theory Save Notice Pleading?, 96 Ind. L.J. 1157 (2021).
Civil Procedure as a Critical Discussion, 20 Nev. L.J. 967 (2020) (with Brian N. Larson) (invited/symposium).
The Conscious Curriculum, 108 Nw. L. Rev. Colloquy 80 (2013) (with Sarah O’Rourke Schrup).
Teaching in Reverse: A Positive Approach to Analytical Errors in 1L Writing, 39 Loy. U. Chi. L.J. 123 (2007) (with Lesley S. Kagan).
Note, Lamb’s Chapel v. Center Moriches Union-Free School District: Creating Greater Protection for Religious Speech Through the Illusion of Public Forum Analysis, 1994 Wis. L. Rev. 965.
Books and Book Chapters
Justice Kennedy, Natural Liberty, and Classical Stasis Theory: Advancing Free Speech with Rhetorical Knowledge and Interpretive Argumentation, in Justice Anthony Kennedy: The Rhetoric of Liberty (David A. Frank & Francis J. Mootz eds., Penn State U. Press) (forthcoming 2023).
Cicero: Legal Stases and the Supreme Court, in Classical Rhetoric & Contemporary Law (Francis J. Mootz et al. eds., U. of Alabama Press) (with Brian N. Larson) (forthcoming 2023).
Advanced Appellate Advocacy (Aspen Publishers 2016) (lead author of textbook with Sarah O’Rourke Schrup, Jeffrey T. Green & Carter G. Phillips).