Reading: Difference between revisions

And what must that review entail? Reading is more than the mechanical ingestion and processing of a string of symbols. When a lawyer reads a contract she is doing something that even a university-educated [[salesperson]] cannot. Reading and interpretation is a dynamic process by which the reader brings her personal metaphorical superstructure — a “schema” — to a text that was composed using a more or less compatible schema.  No two schemas are the same — we all have our foibles and unique experiences, and those variances in everyday life account for much of the human condition. Lawyers have their own special meta-schema — one that requires years learning and refinement.  The lawyer uses this meta-schema to extract meaning and consequences that are unavailable to laypersons. Legal [[magic words]] have special meanings: “[[indemnity]]”; “[[consideration]]”; “[[equitable remedy]]”.  Concepts like these have their own intellectual life and a dog-eared, meandering history which one can trace through centuries of dusty law reports. When she reads a contract, a lawyer brings her own imperfect<ref>And it will be imperfect: most commercial lawyers, for example, have a very dim grip on the concept of an [[indemnity]] for example.?</ref>, idiosyncratic impression of that history to her review.