17 research outputs found
Law School as Straight Space
In honoring Professor Deborah L. Rhode’s commitment to making space for the marginal in legal education and clarifying the “no-problem” problems in our midst, Professor Ballakrishnen’s Essay focuses on one strain of nonnormative experience—that of genderqueer persons—to clarify the ways in which law schools reinforce linear hierarchies of identity and performance. Professor Ballakrishnen catalogues ethnographic student interview data to highlight perspectives of genderqueer law students, the result of which suggests that “normal” professional practices in law school reinforce the rigidity of the gender binary. They conclude by suggesting that paying attention to these student subpopulations is crucial to reform legal education
Sticky Floors, Springboards, Stairways & Slow Escalators: Mobility Pathways and Preferences of International Students in U.S. Law Schools
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Patterned remittances enhance women’s health-related autonomy
The consequences for women “left behind” by virtue of temporary male migration are known to be mixed. On one hand, concomitant changes in fertility, female labor force participation, and social norms are often associated with increased independence for women. On the other hand, women left behind can be vulnerable to increased dependency on members of their husbands’ family, or face limited access to social institutions. These shifts in women’s capacity for decision-making can have important implications for their health and well-being. Focusing on the state of Kerala in southern India, we examine the conditions under which the remittances that migrants send home have an impact on the health of women left behind. Specifically, we assess the extent to which the timing of remittance sending can support women’s autonomy, and hence improve their autonomous healthcare decision-making and mobility to health facilities. We use evidence from migrant households in Kerala, a region deeply engrained in the world labor migration system for over five decades. Analysis is conducted with representative household survey data from the 2016 wave of the Kerala Migration Study (KMS), and paired with in-depth qualitative interviews with women in Kerala whose husbands and other family members have migrated to the Gulf. We show that the positive effect of remittances on women’s autonomy manifests primarily through the timing of remittance receipt, not the amount of money remitted. Those who receive regular remittances experience more gains in autonomy, as compared to those receiving remittances at irregular intervals, net of amount remitted. This finding challenges the usual emphasis on remittance volume as the driving factor of social and behavioral change in sending communities. Analytical efforts should be refocused on the social-interactional component of remittance sending, and how these interactions can impact women’s health and autonomy
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Ratna Kapur: Gender, Alterity, and Human Rights: Freedom in a Fish Bowl
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Ratna Kapur: Gender, Alterity, and Human Rights: Freedom in a Fish Bowl
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Nevertheless They Persisted: Gendered Frameworks and Socialization Advantages in Indian Professional Service Firms.
This article uses the Indian case to offer nuance to narratives about the gendered experience of professional work. I find that while gendered constructs certainly infiltrate all workspaces, there remain occupational and organizational differences in the ways in which women experience their environments. Particularly, while Indian women lawyers overall are more disadvantaged than their international counterparts, the experience of women lawyers in very elite law firms is more favorable than both their local and global peers. A confluence of factors might be responsible for this unusual experience of professional work, but this article highlights the importance of one set of supply side dynamics: the variations in socializing experiences and expectations before entry into these firms. In doing so, it adds to the literature that suggests the importance of not just enrollment parity, but also early training and institutional socialization for gender egalitarian professional outcomes
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Sticky Floors, Springboards, Stairways & Slow Escalators: Mobility Pathways and Preferences of International Students in U.S. Law Schools
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A NEW MINORITY? International JD Students in US Law Schools
This Article reveals the significance of a new and growing minority group within US law schools—international students in the Juris Doctor (JD) program. While international students have received some attention in legal education scholarship, it mostly has been focused on their participation in the context of programs specially designed for this demographic (e.g. postgraduate programs like the LLM and SJD). Drawing from interview data with fifty-eight international JD students across seventeen graduating US law schools, our research reveals the rising importance of international students as actors within a more mainstream institutional context. In examining the ways these students navigate their law school environments, we find that although international status often impacts identity and participation, not all students encounter its impact similarly. Particularly, while some students use the identity to their advantage, others cannot escape negative implications, even with effort. This is consistent with other scholarship on minority students, and adds to a growing literature that uses their socialization experiences to better understand professional stratification. To unpack these different ways of “being international,” we borrow from Goffman’s theorization of stigma to suggest illustrative variations in the ways international students experience their environments. In doing so, we offer an introductory landscape to better understand this growing population and hope this enables new insights to theorize about other kinds of minority experience