Jesus Emilio Esparza
jesusesparza@SanDiego.edu
(619) 260-6840
Professor of Law
- JD, 1996, University of California, Los Angeles
- BA, 1993, University of California, Los Angeles
Areas of Expertise
Trademark Law, Intellectual Property Law, International Intellectual Property Law
Professional Experience
Ramsey was an intellectual property litigation associate for four years at Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich (now DLA Piper) in San Diego and served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Rebecca Beach Smith in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. She joined the USD School of Law faculty in 2004.
Honors and Affiliations
Ramsey received the USD School of Law’s Thorsnes Prize for Outstanding Legal Scholarship in 2020-2021 and the Class of 1975 Endowed Professorship in 2017-2018 for her excellence in teaching and scholarship. Ramsey’s articles, "Raising the Threshold for Trademark Infringement to Protect Free Expression" in 72 American University Law Review 1225 (2023) (with Christine Haight Farley) and “Descriptive Trademarks and the First Amendment” in 70 Tennessee Law Review 1095 (2003), were judged by the editor of the Entertainment, Publishing, and the Arts Handbook (Tripp, ed.) (Thomson Reuters, 2024) and Intellectual Property Law Review (Tripp, ed.) (West, 2004) to be one of the best articles in these areas of law in 2023 and 2003, respectively. She is a member of the Order of the Coif, the American Intellectual Property Law Association, the International Association for the Advancement of Teaching and Research in Intellectual Property, and the International Trademark Association.
Scholarly Work
- Trademarks and Free Speech: Conflicts and Resolutions (Cambridge University Press 2026)
- Raising the Threshold for Trademark Infringement to Protect Free Expression, 72 American University Law Review 1225 (2023) (with Christine Haight Farley)
- Protectable Trademark Subject Matter in Common Law Countries and the Problem with Flexibility, in The Cambridge Handbook of International and Comparative Trademark Law (Irene Calboli & Jane Ginsburg eds., Cambridge University Press 2020)
- Using Failure to Function Doctrine to Protect Free Speech and Competition in Trademark Law, 104 Iowa Law Review Online 70 (2020)
- Free Speech Challenges to Trademark Law After Matal v. Tam, 56 Houston Law Review 401 (2018)
- Non-Traditional Trademarks and Inherently Valuable Expression, in The Protection of Non-Traditional Marks: Critical Perspectives (Irene Calboli & Martin Senftleben eds., Oxford University Press 2018)
- A Free Speech Right to Trademark Protection, 106 Trademark Reporter 797 (2016)
- Reconciling Trademark Rights and Free Expression Locally and Globally, in International Intellectual Property: A Handbook of Contemporary Research (Daniel Gervais ed., Edward Elgar Publishing 2015)