Law and Gender Commons^™

Body And Soul: Equality, Pregnancy, And The Unitary Right To Abortion, Jennifer S. Hendricks

Publications

This Article explores equality-based arguments for abortion rights, revealing both their necessity and their pitfalls. It first uses the narrowness of the "health exception" to abortion regulations to demonstrate why equality arguments are needed--namely because our legal tradition's conception of liberty is based on male experience, no theory of basic human rights grounded in women's reproductive experiences has developed. Next, however, the Article shows that equality arguments, although necessary, can undermine women's reproductive freedom by requiring that pregnancy and abortion be analogized to male experiences. As a result, equality arguments focus on either the bodily or the social aspect of …

Barriers To Financing: Is European Union Indirect Discrimination Law The Answer For Female Entrepreneurs?, Adam G. Panopoulos

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note explores whether European Union indirect discrimination law, particularly Directive 2004/113/EC, can address the barriers female entrepreneurs face in accessing financing. It examines the application of indirect discrimination principles to financial services, analyzing ECJ case law and advocating for the integration of gender mainstreaming to enhance gender equality in entrepreneurship.

Sharing The Stage: Using Title Vii To End Discrimination Against Female Playwrights On Broadway, Marisa Rothstein

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

'Struck' By Stereotype: Ruth Bader Ginsburg On Pregnancy Discrimination As Sex Discrimination, Neil S. Siegel, Reva B. Siegel

Faculty Scholarship

This is an attempt at recovery. This Essay hopes to call attention to then-Professor Ruth Bader Ginsburg's merits brief in Struck v. Secretary of Defense. The brief has been under appreciated in part because the Supreme Court declined to decide the case. But anyone seeking to understand the origins and nature of Justice Ginsburg's views on sex discrimination would be well advised to read this brief. So would anyone interested in reimagining the bounds of constitutional possibility in the realm of gender equality.

Making Up Is Hard To Do: Race/Gender/Sexual Orientation In The Law School Classroom, Adrienne D. Davis, Robert S. Chang

Scholarship@WashULaw

This exchange of letters picks up where Professors Adrienne Davis and Robert Chang left off in an earlier exchange that examined who speaks, who is allowed to speak, and what is remembered. Here, Professors Davis and Chang explore the dynamics of race, gender, and sexual orientation in the law school classroom. They compare the experiences of African American women and Asian American men in trying to perform as law professors, considering how makeup and other gender tools simultaneously assist and hinder such performances. Their exchange examines the possibility of bias that complicates the use of student evaluations in assessing teaching …

Close Encounters Of Three Kinds: On Teaching Dominance Feminism And Intersectionality, Kimberlé W. Crenshaw

Faculty Scholarship

I am pleased to be a part of this symposium honoring Catharine MacKinnon's groundbreaking work as a feminist theorist, legal advocate, and global activist. This invitation not only presents the opportunity to examine the interface between dominance theory and intersectionality, but also the occasion to delve further into the vexed rhetorical politics surrounding feminism and antiracism.

By now the fact that there has been a contested relationship between antiracism and feminism is almost axiomatic.1 Yet as with most things that have become matters of common knowledge, there is a risk that generalizations can metastasize into hardened conclusions that obscure rather …

The Basic Law At 60 - Equality And Difference: A Proposal For The Guest List To The Birthday Party, Susanne Baer

Articles

The German constitution, named "Basic Law", has proven to work although many did not believe in it when it was framed. Others emphasize desiderata. Sabine Berghahn commented at the 50th birthday that it has developed "far too slowly and [some] has even gone completely wrong." ' Jutta Limbach, former President of the Federal Constitutional Court, observed that constitutional history was "anything but regal, but very difficult and full of obstacles. '' 2 Former Chancellor Willy Brandt famously called the constitution "a snail on thin ice." So what is missing when we analyze the Basic Law, and what should be finally …

Law's Expressive Value In Combating Cyber Gender Harassment, Danielle Keats Citron

Michigan Law Review

The online harassment of women exemplifies twenty-first century behavior that profoundly harms women yet too often remains overlooked and even trivialized. This harassment includes rape threats, doctored photographs portraying women being strangled, postings of women's home addresses alongside suggestions that they are interested in anonymous sex, and technological attacks that shut down blogs and websites. It impedes women's full participation in online life, often driving them offline, and undermines their autonomy, identity, dignity, and well-being. But the public and law enforcement routinely marginalize women's experiences, deeming the harassment harmless teasing that women should expect, and tolerate, given the internet's Wild …

Transgender Bathroom Usage: A Privileging Of Biology And Physical Difference In The Law, Jill D. Weinberg

Buffalo Journal of Gender, Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

(Still) Not Fit To Be Named: Moving Beyond Race To Explain Why 'Separate' Nomenclature For Gay And Straight Relationships Will Never Be 'Equal', Courtney Megan Cahill

Scholarly Publications

No abstract provided.

The Beginning Of The Second Wave Of The Women's Movement And Where We Are Today: A Personal Account, Sonia Pressman Fuentes

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

The second wave of the women’s movement, which started in the early 1960s, revolutionized women’s legal rights in the U.S. and reverberated in the rest of the world. Ms. Fuentes, a founder of NOW (National Organization for Women) and the first woman attorney in the Office of the General Counsel at the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), discusses the beginning of this movement, her role in it, the changes that have occurred since then, and the problems that remain in the US and throughout the world today.

Harassment Handbook, Jovon Bell, Kevin Blanch, Vashon Broadnax, Dallas Cline, Candi Lee

Parameters of Law in Student Affairs and Higher Education (CNS 670)

Harassment presents itself as a challenging annoyance, which most everyone will have to confront over a period of time. As defined by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, harassment is commonly transferred via some type of unwelcome communicated behavior, which includes discrimination (2007). There are several motives for which harassment can occur, including race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and disability. Titles VI and VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 are two federal discrimination laws that help protect residents of the United States from occurrences including both discrimination and harassment, that …

Marriage Or Liberation? Reflections On Two Strategies In The Struggle For Lesbian And Gay Rights And Relationship Recognition, Edward D. Stein

Articles

A great deal has changed about the legal and social situation for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgender (LGBT) people since the 1989 publication of Tom Stoddard and Paula Ettelbrick's dueling essays about how the quest for same-sex marriage fit into the larger struggle for LGBT rights. In 1989, twenty-four states and the District of Columbia criminalized most forms of adult consensual sex between people of the same sex and the constitutionality of such sodomy laws had been recently upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in Bowers v. Hardwick in an opinion that said arguments against the constitutionality of such …

Bloodstains On A "Code Of Honor": The Murderous Marginalization Of Women In The Islamic World, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

In the real world of the Twenty-first Century, deep biases against women are prevalent in much of Muslim society. Although there is no explicit approval of honor killing in Islamic law (Sharia), its culture remains fundamentally patriarchal. As unfathomable as it is to Western minds, "honor killing" is a facet of traditional patriarchy, and its condonation can be traced largely to ancient tribal practices. Justifications for it can be found in the codes of Hammurabi and in the family law of the Roman Empire. Unfortunately, honor killings in the Twenty-first Century are not isolated incidents, nor can they be regarded …

Empowerment Or Estrangement: Liberal Feminism's Visions Of The “Progress” Of Muslim Women, Cyra Akila Choudhury

Faculty Publications

This paper presents some thoughts on the progress of Muslim women towards gender justice. It argues that Liberal Legal feminism shares a common understanding of history and progress with those Liberal political theories that justified the British Empire. Because of this genealogy, Liberal feminism seeks to reform cultures and societies that do not comport with a particular Liberal teleology that forecloses the expression of alternative ideas of history, progress, and human flourishing. It further argues that Muslim women's organizations that partner with Northern organizations sometimes seek to fulfill Liberal expectations of victimhood at the hands of their culture. The consequence …

The Substance Of Substantive Equality: Gender Equality And Turkey's Headscarf Debate, Rachel Rebouche

American University International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Cutt Ing Funds For Oral Contracept Ives: Violation Of Equal Protection Rights And The Disparate Impact On Women’S Healt Hcare, Rachel V. Rose

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Untold Stories: Gender-Related Persecution And Asylum In South Africa, Lindsay M. Harris

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article explains the particular difficulties that female asylum seekers and survivors of gender-related persecution face, reaffirming the need for the practical and sensitive application of international and domestic gender guidelines. Extensive research into client files and interviews with key decision makers prove that, despite scholarship suggesting that women may be advantaged in asylum proceedings, a focus on gender is still needed in the South African context. While there are undoubtedly problematic elements of the 1998 Refugees Act warranting its revision, the addition of gender as an additional category under the refugee definition, as proposed by the recent Refugees Amendment …

Student Gladiators And Sexual Assault: A New Analysis Of Liability For Injuries Inflicted By College Athletes, Ann Scales

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article will focus on an issue that was probably not on the minds of 19th century educators, nor primarily on the minds of the legions of present-day academic critics of intercollegiate sports. Namely, this Article explores the ways in which big-time athletics- particularly football-normalize and encourage harms to women, including educational and sexual harms. The author’s theses depend upon acknowledging certain open secrets about college football: that it is a celebration of male physical supremacy (measured by male standards); that it is something that society lets males do and have as their sport, for reasons both good and bad; …

Making Pregnancy Work: Overcoming The Pregnancy Discrimination Act's Capacity-Based Model, Joanna L. Grossman, Gillian Thomas

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This article considers the gaps and obstacles in current law faced by the pregnant woman whose job duties may conflict with pregnancy's physical effects. While there is no inherent conflict between pregnancy and work, women in physically strenuous or hazardous occupations, from nursing to law enforcement, routinely confront situations in which they are physically unable to perform aspects of their job or, though physically able, they seek to avoid certain tasks or situations because of the potential risks to maternal or fetal health. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 (PDA) broadly protects against "pregnancy discrimination," but it provides absolute rights …

Social Factoring The Numbers With Assisted Reproduction, Bridget J. Crawford

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In late winter 2009, the airwaves came alive with stories about Nadya Suleman, the California mother who gave birth to octuplets conceived via assisted reproductive technology. Nadya Suleman and her octuplets are the vehicles through which Americans express their anxiety about race, class and gender. Expressions of concern for the health of children, the mother’s well-being, the future of reproductive medicine or the financial drain on taxpayers barely conceal deep impulses towards racism, sexism and classism. It is true that the public has had a longstanding fascination with multiple births and with large families. This is evidenced by a long …

The State As Batterer: Learning From Family Law To Address American's Family-Like Racial Dysfunction, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

The women's movement for equality bootstrapped to the movement for equality for Blacks. Now the reverse can happen. This Article uses family law and the plight of some battered women, as a lens to address analogous racial conflicts in the broader American family.

Reproducing Gender On Law School Faculties, Ann C. Mcginley

Scholarly Works

This article demonstrates that there is a gender divide on law school faculties. Women work in inferior sex-segregated jobs and teach a disproportionate percentage of female-identified courses. More than 80% of law school deans are men. Men teach the more prestigious male-identified courses. Women suffer from differential expectations from colleagues and students and often bear the brunt of their colleagues' bullying behaviors at work. Using masculinities studies and other social science research to identify gendered structures, practices, and behaviors that harm women law professors, this article provides a theoretical framework to explain why women in the legal academy do not …

Gardasil A Year Later: Cervical Cancer As A Model For Inequality Of Access To Health Services, Micah Globerson

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

This article updates a prior feminist legal analysis of Gardasil, the vaccine against Human Papillomavirus ("HPV"), in light of new developments. Recent discoveries confirming that HPV poses threats to men led Merck & Co. ("Merck") to apply for FDA approval to market Gardasil to males. These developments have renewed focus on the recurring question of whether making Gardasil vaccination a prerequisite for boys' school participation will arouse the same public condemnation that resulted from the prior mandate targeting girls. Another new development involves a vaccine panel recommendation by the Centers for Disease Control ("CDC") that inadvertently resulted in a policy …

Critical Race Feminist Bioethics: Telling Stories In Law School And Medical School In Pursuit Of "Cultural Competency", Deleso Alford Washington

Journal Publications

This article examines how slavery and the concept of race intersect with gender to construct a distinct notion of science and technology that has been historically marginalized at best. The particular aspect of "science" that is explored is the development of the medical specialty of gynecology in the United States. The focal point of this article is to explore a means to address the impact of continuing to tell the narrative on the development of the medical specialty of gynecology in the United States without the benefit of a "herstorical" lens.

Misinformed Consent: Non-Medical Bases For American Birth Recommendations As A Human Rights Issue, Lisa L. Chalidze

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

New York Recognition Of A Legal Status For Same-Sex Couples: A Rapidly Developing Story, Arthur S. Leonard

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Bah V. Mukasey, Sandrine Dehaeze

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Cedaw, Compliance, And Custom: Human Rights Enforcement In Sub-Saharan Africa, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Foreword Symposium: Having It Our Way: Women In Maryland's Workplace Circa 2027, Margaret E. Johnson

All Faculty Scholarship

On November 14, 2007, the University of Baltimore School of Law, the University of Maryland School of Law and the Women's Law Center of Maryland co-sponsored a symposium entitled "Having it Our Way: Women in Maryland's Workplace Circa 2027." The insightful collection of papers in this volume of the University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class represents the work of employment law scholars, public policy specialists, and activists who presented on the current state of Maryland employment law and discussed Maryland's future. This distinguished group of experts and scholars present several themes: the hope of new …