Law Commons^™

On Not "Getting It", Dianne Pothier

Dianne Pothier Collection

Although there has been increasing awareness regarding equity and access issues in the legal profession, that awareness has tended to miss the multi-faceted nature of the problem. The author discusses how the recognition of one kind of barrier may not assist in the recognition of others. Understanding race or gender does not necessarily imply understanding disability or sexual orientation. Students, faculty and practitioners need to challenge and question their assumptions, to guard against barriers to entry and to really belonging.

Bien qu 'ii y ail une prise de conscience grandissante en ce qui touche /es questions d'egalite et d'acces dans …

Lesbians, Gays And The Struggle For Equality Rights: Reversing The Progressive Hypothesis, Mary Eaton

Dalhousie Law Journal

The tale often told of Canadian law's advancement in the field of sexual orientation rights is simple but sublime: law has moved, however ploddingly and not without substantial prodding, out of an epoch of almost total repression, into an evermore enlightened era. Castigated by criminal law, pushed to the perimeter by administrative law, and ignored by human rights law, the "homosexual"' had once been law's quintessential "other." In recent years, however, legislatures and courts have increasingly been willing to recognize "homosexuals" as a constituency too long held down by the heavy hand of legal control. Most penal prohibitions against exercises …

A Postmodern Constitutionalism: Equality Rights, Identity Politics, And The Canadian National Imagination, Carl F. Stychin

Dalhousie Law Journal

In the 1990s, "identity" has become the centrepiece of theoretical work in a variety of disciplines. We now know that, in the conditions of late modem (or postmodem) society, identity is complex-it is fragmented, intersected, subject to alteration, socially constructed and it exhibits only a partial fixity at any moment. Most important, identities are to be valued, respected, and understood on their own terms. However, we also have relearned (if we ever forgot) that identities can be dangerous and fatal, especially when they coalesce in the form of nationalism. In this article, I will explore the intersection of nationalism and …

Sexual Orientation As A Human Rights Issue Incanada 1969-1985, Philip Girard

Dalhousie Law Journal

Equality is a protean concept. Even if one has taken a position on the equality of opportunity versus equality of outcomes debate, there remains the problem of deciding what equality means in particular contexts: racial equality, equality between the sexes, between those with and without mental or physical disability, and so on. Finally, there is the issue of which groups in society are entitled to "equality", whatever it may mean. Given the open-ended nature of the equality guarantees contained in section 15 of Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms, it is clear that groups other than those specifically mentioned therein …