MADISON/BERKELEY, CA - With all of the sadness in the universe, Lauren Edelman's loving sisters wish to share the passing of our brilliant, kind, brave, caring and unimaginably generous sister.

Laurie died unexpectedly after a two month illness, leaving all of us stunned, sad, and wishing for more years with her. Laurie (or Lauren, as many insist on calling her – but to us she was our Laurie) was known for her professional success as a beloved professor of law and sociology at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, and specifically the Jurisprudence and Social Policy (JSP) program, after receiving her J.D. from Berkeley and her Ph.D. from Stanford. Before Berkeley, she taught at the University of Wisconsin Madison in sociology.

After joining the Berkeley law faculty in 1996, she was appointed the Agnes Roddy Robb Professor of Law and Professor of Sociology. She served as secretary and as president of the Law and Society Association. She was a fellow at the Rockefeller Center in Bellagio, Italy. She was a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford.

In 2022, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Science. She had so many beloved graduate students and colleagues, and her award-winning book Working Law: Courts, Corporations and Symbolic Civil Rights (University of Chicago Press 2016), won the 2017 George R. Terry Book Award from the Academy of Management. Her many other published works were also renowned and celebrated, as was she.

She held many important positions at Berkeley Law, including serving as Faculty Director of the Center for the Study of Law and Society from 2004 - 2009, and as Chair and Associate Dean for Jurisprudence and Social Policy from 2010 - 2013.

In fact, we as her sisters were completely awed when we realized the full extent of her stunning impact as a visionary in her field. We knew she was smart, but as us Wisconsites might say, "Holy Cow, she was amazing."

What we want to also point out is that Laurie was a truly excellent person who left her mark on the world in many many ways other than her professional success. Here is an attempt to capture the layers of her amazing life:

She was a wonderful daughter to our parents Murray Edelman and Bacia Edelman. Like Murray, she excelled in her academic field. Like Bacia, she became a talented artist later in life – both a jeweler and a potter. We treasure her art which improved on an impressive trajectory, and we can only imagine the heights she would have reached. She spent every Friday evening with her "Claydies" - a group of women who loved to make pottery.

She was a devoted sister to us, Judith Edelman-Green and Sarah Coyne, and a wonderful giving generous aunt who actively loved her nieces and nephew, Emily Coyne, Leah Coyne, Anna Coyne, Raphi Green, Shira Green and Ilana Goldberg. They loved her too.

She had so many beloved colleagues – in Working Law she acknowledged many including but not limited to the following heartbroken people: Howie Erlanger, Rosann Greenspan, Catherine Albiston, Malcolm Feeley, Calvin Morill, Brent Nakamura, Laura Beth Nielsen, Robin Stryker, Mark Suchman, and so many others.

She had so many dear friends - including all of the above as well as her kindred spirit Beth Feingold, her dear friends; Rosann deserves a second mention here given their famous Thelma and Louise roadtrip, with Juno across the US in 2021, Ellyn Bush, Catherine Martikan, David Mostardi, Tina Stevens, Wendy Lyle, Val King and Margo Rodriguez – and so many others. Many of these devoted people urgently made time in their busy schedules to visit her (or planned to) during her illness in the state of Washington.

She was The World's Most Loving Dog Owner to Laika, Nishka, Zola and Juno – we believe she is with the first three in the afterlife if there is an afterlife – Laurie probably did not think so, but we hope that she was wrong. Juno will be joining her Aunt Sarah and her beloved canine cousins, Maisy and Charlie, for a life on the river in Stoughton, WI.

She was an advocate for women and for the disadvantaged, and cared so much for everyone. As an example, when Sarah arrived at the hospital to visit her when she could barely move and could only whisper, she wanted to make sure that her beloved cleaning person Conchy was taken care of – and that nobody put pressure on her dear friend Beth to visit given that Beth's dog Tovi has a serious illness. Those were literally the first two thoughts she expressed.

We will remember Laurie forever and we are so sad (and a little mad) that she left us prematurely. We take comfort in the fact that she made her mark on the world in a way that so few people do – she contributed meaningfully to the universe.

Laurie, we love you forever.

In lieu of flowers, please send donations in Laurie's name to Paw Fund: https://pawfund.org/.

To plant trees in memory, please visit the Sympathy Store.

Published by Madison.com on Mar. 12, 2023.