Ward Farnsworth

Nancy E. Barton Scholar
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs
Professor of Law
B.A., Wesleyan University
J.D., with high honors, University of Chicago Law School

Interests: Tort law; civil procedure; jurisprudence; rhetoric

After graduating from the University of Chicago in 1994, Ward Farnsworth worked as a law clerk to Richard A. Posner, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, and to Anthony M. Kennedy, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court. In 1996, he served as a legal adviser to the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal in The Hague. Professor Farnsworth joined the BU Law faculty in 1997and now teaches courses on a variety of subjects, including civil procedure, torts, contracts, and rhetoric. "When I entered this profession, I hoped that I would be at a school where teaching was an important focus for faculty, not an afterthought," he says. "Nowhere is that more true than here. Teaching is every bit as important a part of our mission as scholarship. It's an easy commitment to make because the students here are terrific; they're smart, interesting people who are excited about learning and are preparing to do important things when they leave."

Professor Farnsworth is the author of The Legal Analyst, published by the University of Chicago Press in 2007, and Farnsworth's Classical English Rhetoric, published in 2010 by David R. Godine. He also is co-author of Torts: Cases and Questions (with Mark Grady), and is Reporter for the American Law Institute's Restatement of the Law Third, Torts: Liability for Economic Harm.