Law and Gender Commons^™

Granting Political Asylum To Potential Victims Of Female Circumcision, Gregory A. Kelson

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

Part I of this article examines two cases. In one case, a United States immigration court allowed female circumcision as a defense to deportation. In another case, the Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board granted political asylum after recognizing female circumcision as a form of persecution. Part II assesses the extent of protections currently provided for potential victims of female circumcision under U.S. asylum law and analyzes the factors that a court should consider when making asylum determinations. Part III recommends that gender should be added to the enumerated grounds for persecution under U.S. asylum law. This section provides a hypothetical …

A Case For Pregnancy-Based Unemployment Insurance, Mark R. Brown

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Professor Brown argues that unemployment insurance laws should be amended to provide coverage to otherwise eligible, pregnant claimants. Under current law, women who quit because of pregnancy are either disqualified from receiving unemployment benefits altogether or qualify only after childbirth. Those who are fired, meanwhile, often either cannot prove the motivation for their discharge or discover that they are disqualified because of their unavailability for work. Professor Brown uses a case study to illustrate the problems posed by pregnancy and unemployment insurance. He proposes model legislation that extends coverage to all pregnant claimants who temporarily separate from their employment.

The Politics Of Collective Security, Anne Orford

Michigan Journal of International Law

Part I argues that conventional international legal analyses about Security Council actions do not consider the gender-differentiated effects of those actions. The universality of male interests is taken for granted by international lawyers. The first level of analysis thus involves adding women in; that is, considering the consequences that Security Council actions have had for women in Kuwait, Iraq, Cambodia, Somalia, Mozambique, Bosnia, and the United States. I argue that many women are in fact rendered less secure by actions authorized by the Security Council in the name of collective security. As a result, women must have a voice in …

Homologizing Pregnancy And Motherhood: A Consideration Of Abortion, Julia E. Hanigsberg

Michigan Law Review

In this essay I reconsider abortion in order to bridge what initially seem to be two opposing frameworks: first, the conception of abortion as an issue of women's bodily integrity and liberty, and second, the acknowledgement of the existence and meaning of intrauterine life. The abortion choice is indeed deeply and necessarily tied to women's bodily integrity. I will discuss how taking away women's ability to control their decision not to become mothers can be severely damaging to their very sense of self, for this denial of decisionmaking divides women from their wombs and uses their wombs for a purpose …

Fictionalizing Harassment—Disclosing The Truth, Maria L. Ontiveros

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Disclosure by Michael Crichton, and Bearing Witness: Sexual Harassment and Beyond—Everywoman's Story by Celia Morris

Constitutional Misconceptions, Radhika Rao

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Children of Choice: Freedom and the New Reproductive Technologies by John A. Robertson

Putting Women First, Mary Coombs

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Gender, Crime, and Punishment by Kathleen Daly

The Countermajoritarian Paradox, Neal Davis

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Liberty and Sexuality: The Right to Privacy and the Making of Roe v. Wade. by David J. Garrow

Pregnancy And Unemployment: Problems And Solutions?, Mark R. Brown

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Abstract for a piece in the 1995 Unemployment Compensation: Continuity and Change symposium presented by the Advisory Council on Unemployment Compensation and the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform.

Mail-Order Brides: Gilded Prostitution And The Legal Response, Eddy Meng

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note explores the international mail-order bride industry where women from Asia and other developing countries are trafficked to men in Western industrialized countries. The author discusses the commonalities between the mail-order bride traffic and other forms of sexual exploitation, as well as the cultural and historical forces and the gender, ethnic, and class subordination which together fuel the demand for Asian Pacific mail-order brides. In the United States, the potential for exploitation is made greater in that immigrant brides face a threat of deportation during the first two years of residence via immigration laws. Given the inequalities between consumer-husbands …

Structuralist And Cultural Domination Theories Meet Title Vii: Some Contemporary Influences, Martha Chamallas

Michigan Law Review

This essay first looks at three important theoretical approaches - motivational, structural, and cultural - that mark the scholarly discourses on workplace equality since 1965. The motivational or individual choice theory is well established and has dominated legal discourse throughout this period. I concentrate in this essay on the other two visions, dating structuralist accounts from the mid1970s and cultural domination theories from the mid-1980s.

The Anticaste Principle, Cass R. Sunstein

Michigan Law Review

In this essay, I seek to defend a particular understanding of equality, one that is an understanding of liberty as well. I call this conception "the anticaste principle." Put too briefly, the anticaste principle forbids social and legal practices from translating highly visible and morally irrelevant differences into systemic social disadvantage, unless there is a very good reason for society to do so. On this view, a special problem of inequality arises when members of a group suffer from a range of disadvantages because of a group-based characteristic that is both visible for all to see and irrelevant from a …

Title Vii And The Complex Female Subject, Kathryn Abrams

Michigan Law Review

One strength of Title VII has been its capacity to accommodate the changing conceptions of discrimination and the self-conceptions of subject groups. In the first decades of its enforcement, advocates have raised - and courts have endorsed - a range of contrasting conceptions in order to broaden the employment opportunities of protected groups. This flexibility is particularly evident with respect to women.

After exploring recent doctrinal efforts to respond to complex claimants, I address these questions and assess the prospects of change. Although the unitary or categorical notions of group identity under which Title VII has historically been enforced might …

Employment Discrimination Law In Perspective: Three Concepts Of Equality, John J. Donohue Iii

Michigan Law Review

The essay begins with a discussion of which groups deserve the protection of employment discrimination law. With the protected categories of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act etched into the American consciousness, many might consider the appropriate categories to be fully self-evident. But of course, they are not, and many jurisdictions continue to struggle over whether certain dispreferred groups merit the law's solicitude.

The Michael Jackson Pill: Equality, Race, And Culture, Jerome Mccristal Culp Jr.

Michigan Law Review

This chronicle is in tribute to the work of Derrick Bell, past, present, and future. I have borrowed his character Geneva Crenshaw as part of that tribute, and I hope she helps me raise some of the issues that he has taught us are important.

All characters in this chronicle are fictional, including Professor Culp and Professor Bell. Any relationship they may have to the real Professor Bell and Professor Culp is dictated by the requirements of creativity and the extent to which reality and fiction necessarily merge. I know that the real Derrick Bell is wiser than the one …

Only Girls Wear Barrettes: Dress And Appearance Standards, Community Norms, And Workplace Equality, Katharine T. Bartlett

Michigan Law Review

In this essay I study both the judicial rationales and the scholarly criticisms thereof, agreeing with critics that community norms are too discriminatory to provide a satisfactory benchmark for defining workplace equality, but also questioning the usual implications of this critique. Critics assume that it is possible, and desirable, to evaluate dress and appearance rules without regard to the norms and expectations of the community - that is, according to stable or universal versions of equality that are uninfected by community norms. I question this assumption, arguing that equality, no less than other legal concepts, cannot transcend the norms of …

Divorce, Custody, Gender, And The Limits Of Law: On Dividing The Child, Lee E. Teitelbaum

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody by Elanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin

Religion And The Search For A Principled Middle Ground On Abortion, Michael W. Mcconnell

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Politics of Virtue: Is Abortion Debatable? by Elizabeth Mensch and Alan Freeman

Only Words, David C. Dinielli

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Only Words by Catharine A. MacKinnon

The Lenses Of Gender: Transforming The Debate On Sexual Inequality, Jill M. Dahlmann

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Lenses of Gender: Transforming the Debate on Sexual Inequality by Sandra Lipsitz Bem

Slavery Rhetoric And The Abortion Debate, Debora Threedy

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

There are many things that could be, and have been, said about the question of abortion. This article focuses on the rhetoric of the abortion debate. Specifically, I discuss how both sides of the abortion debate have appropriated the image of the slave and used that image as a rhetorical tool, a metaphor, in making legal arguments. Further, I examine the effectiveness of this metaphor as a rhetorical tool. Finally, I question the purposes behind this appropriation, and whether it reflects a lack of sensitivity to the racial content of the appropriated image.

Tying A Slipknot: Temporary Marriages In Iran, Tamilla F. Ghodsi

Michigan Journal of International Law

The purpose of this Note is to analyze the institution of mut'a critically, but objectively. It is important to first understand that it is possible to learn something from this institution. The sanctioning of temporary marriages illustrates the pervasive role of law as a method of social control, a characteristic which has parallels in the West. Furthermore, the institution may be challenged on its merits. For example, this Note intends to illustrate how the lack of formalism and the presence of great ambiguity in the institution have contributed to its lack of acceptance in Iranian society. The institution's deficiencies demonstrate …

Verbal Sexual Harassment As Equality-Depriving Conduct, Keith R. Fentonmiller

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Part I of this Note argues that commentators like Browne and some courts have mischaracterized the harm of verbal sexual harassment as mere "offense." Rather, the true harm of a sexually hostile environment created by words and expressive conduct extends beyond offense, emotional distress, and economic displacement; at bottom, the harm is equality-deprivation.

Part II explains how a sexually hostile environment is equality-depriving by arguing that words which create a sexually hostile environment must be understood in historical and social context. Words can be used not only to communicate ideas but also to perform acts of coercion and sexual abuse. …

Stress And Health In 1st-Year Law Students: Women Fare Worse, Daniel N. Mcintosh, Julie Keywell, Alan Reifman, Phoebe C. Ellsworth

Articles

The social and psychological consequences of being a female law student may include greater stress and worse health than that experienced by male students. First-year law students at a major state university were surveyed about their physical and psychological health prior to, in the middle of, and at the end of the school year. They were also asked about specific sources of strain (e.g., grades, time pressure) at mid-year. Relative to men, women reported greater strain due to sexism, lack of free time, and lack of time to spend with one’s spouse/partner. Women also displayed more depression and physical symptoms …

Understanding Mixed Motives Claims Under The Civil Rights Act Of 1991: An Analysis Of Intentional Discrimination Claims Based On Sex-Stereotyped Interview Questions, Heather K. Gerken

Michigan Law Review

This Note analyzes the Civil Rights Act of 1991 and relevant case law to determine whether posing sex-stereotyped interview questions is actionable conduct under Title VII. It questions whether proof of discrimination during a phase in the hiring process, specifically during the interview stage, supports a Title VII claim without other independent evidence that the hiring decision was discriminatory. Part I explains that the circuit courts have envisioned the impact of discrimination during the hiring process differently and, as a result, are divided in determining whether sex-stereotyped interview questions are actionable under Title VII. Part II examines the legislative history …

A Question Of Choice, Michele A. Estrin

Michigan Law Review

A Review of A Question of Choice by Sarah Weddington

Rape Discourse In Press Coverage Of Sex Crimes, Peggy Reeves Sanday

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Virgin or Vamp: How the Press Covers Sex Crimes

"But Whoever Treasures Freedom…": The Right To Travel And Extraterritorial Abortions, Seth F. Kreimer

Michigan Law Review

In a prior article, I addressed the problem of extraterritorial abortions under the assumption that the federal constitutional right of reproductive choice would be repudiated by the Supreme Court on Justice Scalia's theory that such rights lack sufficiently deep roots in the history and traditions surrounding the framing of the Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment. I argued there that a constitutional methodology that relied on traditions and expectations of the Framers would provide a strong basis for concluding that the Constitution imposes severe limits on states' power to project their moralities extraterritorially. If Justice Scalia is serious about a regard …

Conflict Of Constitutions? No Thanks: A Response To Professors Brilmayer And Kreimer, Gerald L. Neuman

Michigan Law Review

This colloquy was organized around the unpleasant hypothesis that the Supreme Court would overrule Roe v. Wade and that Congress would not fill the resulting void with federal legislation. The abortion debate would then move to the states, where local majorities could enact their own resolutions. If the local majorities were large enough, they could even write their local resolutions into their state constitutions. The contrasting state constitutions that could result might then replicate the comparativists' current juxtaposition between the U.S. Constitution and the constitutions of Germany and Ireland. In some states, prohibition of abortion would be constitutionally required, while …

Prostitution And Male Supremacy, Andrea Dworkin

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

The assumptions of academia can barely begin to imagine the reality of life for women in prostitution. Academic life is premised on the notion that there is a tomorrow and a next day and a next day; or that someone can come inside from the cold for time to study; or that there is some kind of discourse of ideas and a year of freedom in which you can have disagreements that will not cost you your life. These are premises that those who are students here or who teach here act on every day. They are antithetical to the …