Law and Gender Commons^™

After Ellerth: The Tangible Employment Action In Sexual Harassment Analysis, Susan Grover

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Article, Professor Grover argues that courts too readily allow employers to avoid vicarious liability for supervisors' unlawful sexual harassment of subordinates. The Article explores the breadth of the affirmative defense first introduced in the Supreme Court's 1998 cases of Faragher v. Boca Raton and Burlington Indus., Inc. v. Ellerth. That defense clears an employer of liability for a supervisor's unlawful sexual harassment if (a) the employer exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct promptly any sexually harassing behavior, and (b) the plaintiff employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of any preventive or corrective opportunities provided by the …

Parental-Status Employment Discrimination: A Wrong In Need Of A Right?, Peggie R. Smith

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article evaluates strategies to challenge employment discrimination based on parental status. Specifically, it examines proposals put forth by some commentators to establish parental status as a protected class. While such a suggestion is attractive, the Article argues that it ultimately offers few practical advantages and remains wedded to a limited conception of equality, requiring only that employment decisions not reflect differences based on parenthood. Consequently, such a strategy would satisfy anti-discrimination legislation so long as both men and women with parental obligations are equally ill-treated. The Article concludes that a shift in perspective from gender to parental status will …

Our Economy Of Mothers And Others: Women And Economics Revisited, Joan C. Williams

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Customer Is Always Right… Not! Employer Liability For Third Party Sexual Harassment, Lea B. Vaughn

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This article will ask a series of questions. What is third party sexual harassment? Under what conditions does it occur? Does it differ in any significant respects from traditional notions of sexual harassment? Should those differences, if any, make a difference in the way that the legal system addresses third party harassment? And indeed, should the problem be addressed solely through the legal system? What might an employer do to alleviate sexual harassment of this type?

"Just Like One Of The Family": Domestic Violence Paradigms And Combating On-The-Job Violence Against Household Workers In The United States, Kristi L. Graunke

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article argues that the immense problem of on-the-job abuse experienced by domestic workers demands a multifaceted plan of attack. The proposed responses specifically draw upon the capacities, strengths, and resources of women, particularly comparatively privileged women, as both activists and employers of domestic workers. By describing the circumstances of domestic work in the United States from the nation's inception to the present, Part I demonstrates the prevalence and intractability of on-the-job physical and sexual abuse and argues that other women, as employers of domestic workers, have historically played a complex role in participating in, condoning, or failing to acknowledge …

"It's Snowing Down South": How To Help Mothers And Avoid Recycling The Sameness/Difference Debate, Joan C. Williams

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Canaries In The Mine: Work/Family Conflict And The Law, Joan C. Williams

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Family-Hostile Corporation, Joan C. Williams

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Job Segregation, Gender Blindness, And Employee Agency Symposium: Law, Labor, And Gender - New Perspectives On Labor And Gender, Tracy E. Higgins

Faculty Scholarship

Almost forty years after the enactment of Title VII, women's struggle for equality in the workplace continues. Although Title VII was intended to "break[] down old patterns of segregation and hierarchy," the American workplace remains largely gender-segregated. Indeed, more than one-third of all women workers are employed in occupations in which the percentage of women exceeds 80%. Even in disciplines in which women have made gains, top status (and top paying) jobs remain male-dominated while the lower status jobs are filled by women. This pattern of gender segregation, in turn, accounts for a substantial part of the persistent wage gap …

For White Women: Your Blues Ain't Like Mine, But We All Hide Our Faces And Cry--Literary Illumination For White And Black Sister/Friends, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Let The Jury Decide: The Gap Between What Judges And Reasonable People Believe Is Sexually Harassing, Theresa M. Beiner

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Breaking Out: Vmi And The Coming Of Women By Laura Fairchild Brodie, Melissa Nimit

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

Sexual Harassment And Disparate Impact: Should Non-Targeted Workplace Sexual Conduct Be Actionable Under Title Vii?, Kelly Cahill Timmons

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Corporate Governance As Corporate Social Responsibility: Empathy And Race Discrimination, Cheryl L. Wade

Faculty Publications

This Essay is one of a series of articles I have written that examines persistent racial discrimination in large, publicly held corporations. In spite of legislation prohibiting discrimination, employees of color have alleged that they have been the victims of discriminatory employment practices and racial harassment in the workplaces governed by large companies. Antidiscrimination law has not remedied the racially toxic corporate cultures of many of these companies. Because Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act has no “generalized code of workplace civility,” it does little to ameliorate workplace racial harassment. For this reason, a new approach is required …

Not As Simple As Learning The Abc's: A Comment On Owasso Independent School District No. I-Ol1 V. Falvo And The State Of The Family Educational Rights And Privacy Act, Randi M. Rothberg

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The article examines the Supreme Court's rulings in Falvo and Owasso, which determined that peer grading practices do not violate FERPA as the records involved are not classified as education records. This highlights significant implications for student privacy rights and underscores the need for clarifying FERPA's definitions to prevent future legal disputes.

Victimizing The Victim: Evicting Domestic Violence Victims From Public Housing Based On The Zero-Tolerance Policy, Tara M. Vrettos

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note argues that zero-tolerance eviction policies in public housing, authorized under federal law, unjustly penalize domestic violence victims by evicting them for crimes committed by others, including their abusers. These policies, upheld by the Supreme Court in Rucker, disproportionately harm low-income women, pushing them into homelessness and perpetuating cycles of abuse. The note advocates for a nuanced, case-specific approach to balance public safety and tenant rights, drawing parallels to child custody cases where victims are similarly blamed. It calls for federal reform to protect domestic violence survivors and end their victimization by the legal system.

Introduction To The Symposium: Homophobia In The Halls Of Justice: Sexual Orientation Bias And Its Implications Within The Legal System, Brenda V. Smith, Pamela Bridgewater

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

The gay moment is unavoidable. -Andrew Kopkind

Gay activist, journalist and political commentator Andrew Kopkind made this profound observation at a critical moment in the queer rights movement, in the midst of the March on Washington, pride rallies, queer organizing and the ever strengthening movement to address the AIDS crisis within the queer community. The moment, however, meant different things to participants in the movement. Over the years, the queer or sexual liberation movement transformed itself into a much more equality-based movement with the most energy focused on securing recognition of gay marriage and equal access to the military. As …

Gendered Shades Of Property: A Status Check On Gender, Race & Property, Laura M. Padilla

Faculty Scholarship

This article explores the relationship between gender, race and property.Women in the United States continue to be economically disadvantaged, and women of color are even more disadvantaged. This article will open with a review of laws, past and present, which have shaped women's rights to own, manage and transfer property. It will then provide a status check of where women, including women of color, stand in the United States relative to the rest of the population vis-a-vis income and other indicators of economic well-being. The article will then discuss why economic inequality persists, trotting out the usual reasons of discrimination …

Feminism And International Law: An Opportunity For Transformation, Rosa Ehrenreich Brooks

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In this essay, the author wants to outline briefly both some of the ways in which the assumptions and categories of international law can be damaging to women, and also some of the ways in which creative feminists could use international law to transform both international policy and the domestic political and legal discourse. In the wake of September 11, a robust feminist engagement with international law and policy is more urgent than ever before.

Don’T Blame Canada, Arthur S. Leonard

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Equal Protection Victory, Arthur S. Leonard

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Court Refuses Moot Role, Arthur S. Leonard

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Book Review Of Richard C. Cortner’S Civil Rights And Public Accommodations: The Heart Of Atlanta Motel And Mcclung Cases, Edward A. Purcell Jr.

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Looking Back On Planned Parenthood V. Casey, Christina B. Whitman

Articles

Scholarship that tells us what is really at stake in the lives of people affected makes the law honest and responsive. Whether or not it directly shapes doctrine, this type of scholarship can capture imagination and influence judgment. The Michigan Law Review has published some of the best of this work: Yale Kamisar's articles on coerced confessions, Terry Sandalow's essay on affirmative action, Joe Sax and Phillip Hiestand's description of the emotional impact of living in a slum, Martha Chamallas and Linda Kerber's demonstration of how injuries that uniquely befall women have been dismissed as merely emotional wrongs, and, most …

Fretting In The Force Fields: Why The Distribution Of Social Power Has Proved So Hard To Change, Joan C. Williams

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Parallel Lives: Women's Rights And Lesbian Rights Litigation, Suzanne B. Goldberg

Faculty Scholarship

I love the title of this panel because it gave me a chance to think about the historical themes and emerging issues in law related to women's rights, which of course is a mere endless set of possibilities.

I spent much of the last decade doing lesbian and gay civil rights litigation, and the question that I will focus on today grows out of that work and is a comparative one or at least a relational one. The question is this: What is the relationship between women's rights litigation as it has evolved in the last thirty years and lesbian …

Disability, Equal Protection, And The Supreme Court: Standing At The Crossroads Of Progressive And Retrogressive Logic In Constitutional Classification, Anita Silvers, Michael Ashley Stein

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article compares current disability jurisprudence with the development of sex equality jurisprudence in the area of discrimination. It demonstrates that current disability law resembles the abandoned, sexist framework for determining sex equality and argues that disability equality cases should receive similar analysis as the more progressive, current sex equality standard. As such, the Article attempts to synthesize case law (14th Amendment Equal Protection jurisprudence) and statutory law (Title VII and the ADA) into a comprehensive overview of the state of current disability law viewed within the context of discrimination law in general.

Evaluating The Sex Discrimination Argument For Lesbian And Gay Rights, Edward D. Stein

Articles

The sex discrimination argument for lesbian and gay rights analyzes laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation in terms of sex discrimination. For example, sodomy laws that prohibit only same-sex sexual activities are analyzed as discriminating on the basis of sex because they prohibit women from doing something men are permitted to do, that is, have sex with women. This argument has been championed by some scholars and litigators, and it has persuaded some judges. Edward Stein shows that there are sociological, theoretical, moral, and practical problems facing the sex discrimination argument. He suggests that there are better …

Employer Liability For Sexual Harassment - Normative, Descriptive, And Doctrinal Interactions: A Reply To Professors Beiner And Bisom-Rapp, Linda Hamilton Krieger

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Using Evidence Of Women's Stories In Sexual Harassment Cases, Theresa M. Beiner

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.