WMST 1000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: W. E. B. Du Bois, Catharine Mackinnon, Implicit Stereotype

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Women's Studies
• Course: WMST 1000
• Professor: Amy Butchart

Document Summary

Cautionary note: feminist legal theory is complex, and is related to an even more complex history of feminist intellectual activity and activism. It is far too complicated a collection of ideas to pin down a single doctrine or thesis. Still, there are some common themes running throughout the development of feminist work on the law that deserve our attention. Lets just be critical of the fact that we are putting together radically different ideas under one flag. Most feminist work through the 60s and to the 90s was focused on the laws usually implicit (though sometimes explicit) patriarchy. Men control positions of power, and tend to exclude women (intentionally or not) from positions of power. Many feminists argued that the law was written about theorized, and practiced in accordance with a set of male values: neutrality; objectivity; detachment; equality; autonomy; etc.