Casebook

Casebooks for a course on Criminal Procedure. The West Group book is on the left, and the Aspen Publishing book is on the right.

A casebook is a type of textbook used primarily by students in law schools. Rather than simply laying out the legal doctrine in a particular area of study, a casebook contains excerpts from legal cases in which the law of that area was applied. It is then up to the student to analyze the language of the case in order to determine what rule was applied and how the court applied it. The teaching style based on casebooks is known as the casebook method.

Most casebooks are authored by law professors, usually with two, three, or four authors, at least one of whom will be a professor at the top of his or her field in the area under discussion.

The leading publishers of casebooks in the United States are West Group (publisher of the Foundation Press and American Casebook Series imprints), Aspen Publishing, and LexisNexis. Each of these publishers uses a quickly identifiable color and pattern for their book covers across all subjects.

Casebooks are also what dramaturgs call the comprehensive research notebook they compile on a play in order to aid actors and directors in their interpretation of a script.

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