DiMatteo research project awarded UK Leverhulme Trust Grant

Gainesville, Fla. – Professor Larry A. DiMatteo, Huber Hurst Professor of Contract Law & Legal Studies, has been awarded a United Kingdom Leverhulme Trust Grant. The grant application, sponsored by the University of Leicester, will provide funds for DiMatteo to be in residence at Leicester for Summer 2009. The Grant will support a large empirical research project to be conducted by DiMatteo and Dr. Camilla Andersen of Leicester.

The project involves the training of doctoral students at the University to translate and code more than 2,000 international sales law cases. The data will be analyzed to determine comparative use of legal sources in international business law cases and to analyze comparative legal reasoning methods used by the different national court systems. In making the award, the Trustees stated that “special weight was placed on the originality of the project; the significance of the proposed work; the ability to judge and take appropriate risk in the project; the removal of barriers between traditional disciplines and outstanding levels of competence reflected in the proposed methods, researchers and institution for the intended work.”

DiMatteo will also lecture in a seminar on International Sales Law and deliver two Leverhulme Trust Lectures, Empirical Research in Private Law, and Contextualism in Contract Interpretation. The Grant also provides funds for visits to other universities and institutes in Europe. At a conference at ICN Business School in Nancy, France, DiMatteo will be part of a Panel on Advancement in Academia and, in Germany, he will lecture at the universities of Mainz and Münster on the subject of the United States’ Uniform Commercial Code. DiMatteo will be conducting additional research in England at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (University of London) and the British Institute of International and Comparative Law.