The law is not a neutral body of rules and legal categories often exclude groups or reinforce their disadvantage. Gender discrimination, along with other forms of discrimination, is embedded throughout the legal system, often in ways that are not immediately obvious. This course will look at the body of feminist legal theory and identify its major insights into the ways in which law is gendered and how this contributes to the construction of inequality. Feminist analyses of law provide some of the most significant and challenging explanatory frameworks for understanding the practice and organisation of laws and legal institutions. These insights and frameworks focus on concepts such as the public/private divide, equality and intersectional discrimination, the sexual division of labour and power structures and relationships. The course will examine various areas of human experience such as work and the economy, the family and relationships, reproduction and bodies, the state and citizens in global context, and the way in which law shapes these. Feminist engagements within each area will be explored. The course will consider a range of approaches taken by feminist lawyers to critique, reform and transform law. Various strategies at the local and international level will be studied including the use of human rights to challenge gender inequality and disadvantage.

The course cuts across many fields of law and encourages critical thinking about the role of law and about gender relations more broadly. The course also offers an opportunity for self reflection and personal development, of value regardless of future career path.

Class participation - 30%
Essay Outline - 10%
Essay - 60%

Course materials will be provided in a course pack or on Blackboard.

For additional Information please contact the course convenor, Beth Goldblatt.
b.goldblatt@unsw.edu.au