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Full-Text Articles in Law

Gender Equity In College Athletics: Women Coaches As A Case Study, Deborah L. Rhode, Christopher J. Walker Feb 2007

Gender Equity In College Athletics: Women Coaches As A Case Study, Deborah L. Rhode, Christopher J. Walker

ExpressO

As Title IX celebrates its 35th anniversary, many have noted the positive impact it has had on women sports. But there is also an unintended (and oft-neglected) byproduct: as opportunities for female students have increased, opportunities for female professionals have declined. This Article focuses on the barriers that still confront women in college athletics, particularly those who seek professional positions in coaching and administration. Part I presents a brief overview of Title IX, which makes clear its limitations in securing gender equity. Part II.A discusses the declining representation and lower success rate of women coaches, while Part II.B explores the …


Bias, The Brain, And Student Evaluations Of Teaching, Deborah J Merritt Jan 2007

Bias, The Brain, And Student Evaluations Of Teaching, Deborah J Merritt

ExpressO

Student evaluations of teaching are a common fixture at American law schools, but they harbor surprising biases. Extensive psychology research demonstrates that these assessments respond overwhelmingly to a professor’s appearance and nonverbal behavior; ratings based on just thirty seconds of silent videotape correlate strongly with end-of-semester evaluations. The nonverbal behaviors that influence teaching evaluations are rooted in physiology, culture, and habit, allowing characteristics like race and gender to affect evaluations. The current process of gathering evaluations, moreover, allows social stereotypes to filter students’ perceptions, increasing risks of bias. These distortions are inevitable products of the intuitive, “system one” cognitive processes …


Imagining The Law-Trained Reader: The Faulty Description Of The Audience In Legal Writing Textbooks., Jessica E. Price Sep 2006

Imagining The Law-Trained Reader: The Faulty Description Of The Audience In Legal Writing Textbooks., Jessica E. Price

ExpressO

In law schools today, first-year legal writing courses play a crucial role in helping students learn to communicate about the law. Many legal writing teachers approach legal writing education in a practical way, attempting to pass on their own experiences in law practice settings to students. Unfortunately, as other writers have observed, such reliance on personal knowledge about “what lawyers are like” may lead legal writing teachers to oversimplify a complicated matter – the needs and preferences of the audience for legal writing – and may even amount to indoctrination in stereotypes about law practice. This article offers a closer …


Sex, Trust, And Corporate Boards, Joan M. Heminway Aug 2006

Sex, Trust, And Corporate Boards, Joan M. Heminway

ExpressO

This essay collects and interprets social science research on sex and trust and uses this work to shed new light on the emerging case for gender diversity on corporate boards. Specifically, the essay describes research findings that indicate (1) that men and women trust and are trustworthy on different bases and (2) the existence of a bias against women in corporate leadership positions. Based on this research and current legal scholarship on corporate governance, the essay asserts that gender diversity on corporate boards may be desirable but difficult to attain. The essay also calls for more targeted research on the …


Untying The Knot: An Analysis Of The English Divorce And Matrimonial Causes Court Records, 1858-1866, Danaya C. Wright Jun 2006

Untying The Knot: An Analysis Of The English Divorce And Matrimonial Causes Court Records, 1858-1866, Danaya C. Wright

ExpressO

This paper is an analysis of the petitions, answers, affidavits, and court docket for the first nine years of the English divorce and matrimonial causes court. It examines in detail the child custody, alimony, gender, and class components of the court’s first nine years. After analyzing the petitions and court docket along gender lines for the different causes of action (divorce, separation, annulment, and restitution of conjugal rights), and their success rate by gender and by age of the marriage, it then breaks down marriages by age and speculates on a variety of causes for the different results and considers …


Superstition-Based Injustice In Africa And The United States: The Use Of Provocation As A Defense For Killing Witches And Homosexuals, Jennifer Dumin Jan 2006

Superstition-Based Injustice In Africa And The United States: The Use Of Provocation As A Defense For Killing Witches And Homosexuals, Jennifer Dumin

ExpressO

This Article examines two different instances where strong cultural and religious beliefs suggest that an individual is justified in taking another’s life. Focusing primarily on South Africa and the United States, it argues that the rationale used to defend those who kill suspected witches and those who kill suspected homosexuals is the same – merely because a criminal holds a belief that the victim is evil, the criminal is somehow entitled to a lesser punishment. In the United States, those who readily recognize the absurdity of the witchcraft defense may have some difficulty in recognizing the same level of absurdity …


Constitutional Law—State Employees Have Private Cause Of Action Against Employers Under Family And Medical Leave Act—Nevada Department Of Human Resources V. Hibbs, 538 U.S. 721 (2003)., Gabriel H. Teninbaum Dec 2004

Constitutional Law—State Employees Have Private Cause Of Action Against Employers Under Family And Medical Leave Act—Nevada Department Of Human Resources V. Hibbs, 538 U.S. 721 (2003)., Gabriel H. Teninbaum

ExpressO

The Eleventh Amendment of the United States Constitution provides that non-consenting states are not subject to suit in federal court. Congress may, however, abrogate the states’ sovereign immunity by enacting legislation to enforce the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment. In Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs, the Supreme Court of the United States considered whether Congress acted within its constitutional authority by abrogating sovereign immunity under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which allows private causes of action against state employers to enforce the FMLA’s family-leave provision. The Court held abrogation was proper under the FMLA and state …


The Best Interest Standard: How Broad Judicial Discretion And Influences Of Social And Political Suggestion Have Led To An Abandonment Of The Rule’S Primary Purpose In Child Custody Decisions, Lakeisha J. Johnson Dec 2004

The Best Interest Standard: How Broad Judicial Discretion And Influences Of Social And Political Suggestion Have Led To An Abandonment Of The Rule’S Primary Purpose In Child Custody Decisions, Lakeisha J. Johnson

ExpressO

The vital questions in child custody disputes all concern that which is in the best interest of the child. Historically, interpretations of the “best interest” standard have been founded upon presumptions steeped in the notion of natural rights and duties based largely upon a mix of scientific and subjective conclusions regarding gender-based parenting roles and the need to sustain them. My research demonstrates that, as courts attempt to avoid the decisions of the past and submit to the societal will of the present, the modern application of the “best interest of the child” standard has led unexpectedly to an abandonment …


Paradoxes Of Health And Equality: When A Boy Becomes A Girl, Noa Ben-Asher Aug 2004

Paradoxes Of Health And Equality: When A Boy Becomes A Girl, Noa Ben-Asher

ExpressO

This paper is about an unusual child custody dispute between the parents of a six-year-old child and the child welfare services of Franklin County, Ohio. The conflict emerged when the child’s parents complied with their male child’s professed desire to be treated as a girl by attempting to enroll the child in the first grade as a girl. The paper treats this case as an exemplary test-case of contemporary co-dependence between scientific-medical discourse and liberal-rights discourse. The paper analyzes the positions of the two sides of the custody dispute according to the classic modern distinction between mind and body. On …


Textual Harassment: A New Historicist Reappraisal With Gender In Mind, Hila Keren Aug 2004

Textual Harassment: A New Historicist Reappraisal With Gender In Mind, Hila Keren

ExpressO

No abstract provided.


Lysistrata, Women And War: International Law's Treatment Of Women In Conflict And Post-Conflict Situations, Emma L. Lindsay Mar 2004

Lysistrata, Women And War: International Law's Treatment Of Women In Conflict And Post-Conflict Situations, Emma L. Lindsay

ExpressO

Aristophanes’ Lysistrata is powerful anti-war play often revived during times of international conflict. This paper uses Lysistrata to highlight and critique binary oppositions that underpin the treatment of women in conflict and post-conflict situations in the play and in international law. While many of the experiences of women and girls in war are similar to those of men and boys, there are important differences. Existing inequalities between women and men, and patterns of discrimination against women and girls, tend to be exacerbated in wartime. There are circumstances in which women suffer harms of a different kind and to a different …


Sex Discrimination In The Nineties, Seventies Style: Case Studies In The Preservation Of Male Workplace Norms, Michael L. Selmi Sep 2003

Sex Discrimination In The Nineties, Seventies Style: Case Studies In The Preservation Of Male Workplace Norms, Michael L. Selmi

ExpressO

This article analyzes a series of class action employment discrimination cases that have arisen in the last decade to challenge persistent sex discrimination against women. These cases have targetted the practices in the securities and grocery industries, and include a series of sexual harassment class action claims. These cases pose a challenge to the consensual view that sex discrimination is now perpetuated through subtle practices, and instead highlight the continuing ways in which male norms are preserved in the workplace through intentional acts of hostility and exclusion.