Gender Justice - Spring 2021

Gender Justice GU4506

This course will provide an introduction to the concrete legal contexts in which issues of gender and justice have been articulated, disputed and hesitatingly, if not provisionally, resolved.  Through these readings we will explore the multiple ways in which the law has contended with sexual difference, gender-based stereotypes, and the meaning of equality. So too, we will discuss how feminist theorists have thought about sex, gender and sexuality in understanding and critiquing our legal system and its norms.

Syllabus

January 14^th (Legislative Monday): Intro to the Course: Paradigms of Gender Equality

• Nancy Levit and Robert R.M. Verchick, Feminist Legal Theories, in Feminist Legal Theory, 11 (New York University Press, 2016).

January 25^th: Lisa Sangoi, Movement for Family Power, and Ericka Brewington:  Drug Testing of Pregnant People and Newborns

• "What Ever They Do I'm Her Comfort, I'm Her Protector": How The Foster System Has Become Ground Zero For The U.S. Drug War (Links to an external site.), Movement for Family Power, June 2020
• Molly Schwartz, Do We Need to Abolish Child Protective Services? (Links to an external site.), Mother Jones, December 10, 2020
• Yasmeen Khan, NYC Will End Practice Of Drug Testing Pregnant Patients Without Written Consent (Links to an external site.), Gothamist, November 17, 2020

February 1^st: Khiara Bridges, Berkeley Law, Racial Disparities in Maternal Mortality

• Khiara M. Bridges, Racial Disparities in Maternal Mortality, 95 N.Y.U. L. Rev. 1229 (2020)

February 8^th: Julie Suk, CUNY Grad Center – Equal Rights Amendment

• Julie Suk, The Equal Rights Amendment, Then and Now, forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Feminism and Law in the United States, (eds. Deborah Brake, Martha Chamallas, & Verna Williams, 2021)

February 15^th: Farah Diaz-Tello, If/When/How – Reproductive Justice

• Farah Diaz-Tello, Invisible wounds: obstetric violence in the United States in  Reproductive Health Matters, 24 (2016) pp. 56–64
• McCormack v. Hiedeman, 694 F.3d 1004 (2012) (Reprinted with the permission of LexisNexis)
• Roe's Unfinished Promise: Decriminalizing Abortion Once and For All (Links to an external site.), A report by the SIA Legal Team, 2018
• Fulfilling Roe’s Promise: 2019 Update (Links to an external site.), A report by If/When/How, 2019

February 22^nd: Clement Lee, Sex Workers Project, Justice for Sex Workers

• Un-Meetable Promises: Rhetoric and Reality in New York City’s Human Trafficking Intervention Courts (Links to an external site.), A report by the Global Health Justice Partnership of the Yale Law School and Yale School of Public Health in collaboration with The Sex Workers Project of the Urban Justice Center, September 2018
• Stacey-Leigh Manuel, The Multiplying Threats Facing Sex Workers Today (Links to an external site.)
• Joshua Kaplan and Joaquin Sapien, NYPD Cops Cash In on Sex Trade Arrests With Little Evidence, While Black and Brown New Yorkers Pay the Price (Links to an external site.), December 7, 2020

March 1^st: Spring Break

March 8^th: Early Framing

• Jo Freeman, The Revolution For Women In Law And Public Policy, in Women: A Feminist Perspective (Jo Freeman ed. 1995) pp. 365-404
• Kathleen Neal Cleaver, Racism, Civil Rights, and Feminism, in Critical Race Feminism: A Reader (Wing ed. 1997)
• Gayle Rubin, Gayle Rubin, Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality, in Pleasure and Danger 267 (Carole S. Vance ed., 1984)

March 15^th: Limits of Formal Sex-Based Equality 

• Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 228 (1989) (edited)
• Jesperson v. Harrah’s Operating Co., 392 F.3d 1096 (9^th 2004) (edited)
• Jennifer Levi, Misapplying Equality Theories: Dress Codes at Work, 19 YALE J.L. & Feminism 353 (2008)
• Andre M. Perry, School dress and grooming codes are the new ‘whites only’ signs (Links to an external site.), Brookings, February 14, 2020

March 22^nd: The Pregnant Body

• Trubeck v. UllmanLinks to an external site., 147 Conn. 633 (1960)
• Brief of ACLU in Griswold v. ConnecticutLinks to an external site.
• Litigation: ConnecticutLinks to an external site., in Before Roe v. Wade: Voices that Shaped the Abortion Debate Before the Supreme Court's Ruling (2d edition, 2012) pp. 163-184
• Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973) (edited)
• Gonzales v. Carhart, 550 U.S. 124 (2007) (edited)

March 29^th: Non-Reproductive Sexuality as a Gender Justice Project

• Williams v. Attorney General of Ala.Links to an external site., 378 F.3d 1232 (11th Cir. 2004)
• Reliable Consultants, Inc. v. EarleLinks to an external site., 517 F.3d 738 (5th Cir. 2008)
• Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003) (edited)
• Katherine Franke, Theorizing Yes, 101 Columbia Law Review 181 (2001) (edited)
• Megan Nolan, Joy of Frivolous Sex (Links to an external site.), New York Times, December 22, 2020

April 5^th: Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Discrimination

• Susan Stryker, My Words To Victor Frankenstein Above The Village Of Chamounix: Performing Transgender Rage, GLQ, June 1994
• Robert Phillips, Abjection, TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly, Vol. 1, No. 1, May 2014
• Bostock v. Clayton County, 140 S.Ct. 1731 (2020) (edited)

April 12^th: Marriage Rights vs. Sexual Justice

• Obergefell v. Hodges
  • Opinion of Justice Anthony Kennedy
  • Opinion of Justice Katherine Franke
  • Opinion of Justice Sherif Girgis and Robert George