The Feminist Pervasion: How Gender-Based Scholarship Informs Law and Law Teaching

Joan M. Heminway, The University of Tennessee College of Law

Abstract

This is an edited, annotated transcript of a conference panel discussion on feminism, sex, and gender in law, legal education, and legal scholarship. The transcript reflects widely divergent views of the place of feminism, sex, and gender in the law and legal scholarship. Moreover, the panelists differ as to the role feminism has played in the lives of women as law students and practicing attorneys. In the latter part of the transcript, the panelists' remarks focus in on hotly debated issues surrounding possible gender (or sex) and racial bias in LSAT testing and the innate abilities of women and men as they relate to learning and practicing law. This portion of the piece is exceptionally timely, following on the controversial January 14, 2005 remarks by Harvard University President Lawrence H. Summers relating to inherent differences between men and women in career choice and success.