This call for papers seeks submissions for the University of Baltimore School of Law’s Second Annual Feminist Legal Theory Conference. The conference will be held at the University of Baltimore on Friday, March 6, 2009. The conference will bring together law students, legal academics, practitioners and activists to explore the concrete ways in which feminist legal theory is (or is not) changing the law.
This conference will look at discrete areas of the law and ask how feminist legal theory operates or could operate to expand existing law, create new law, or combat contractions in the law. This conference will address these issues from the perspectives of activists, practitioners and academics. The conference will provide an opportunity for participants and audience members to exchange ideas about the current state of feminist legal theory by looking at how those theories are being actualized in practice and in specific areas of the law. From the conference, we hope to further the discourse about the future of feminist legal theory and its practical applications to the law. In addition, the conference is designed to provide presenters with the opportunity to gain extensive feedback on their papers.
The format of the papers is flexible in order to encourage academics, law students and practitioners to participate. Papers should address the themes discussed above and could focus on the following subject areas: sex, sexuality and gender; education; family law; employment law; poverty and welfare law; civil rights law; bioethics; immigration; international human rights; reproductive justice; criminal law; and women and politics. We encourage papers that explore the intersectionality of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, class, and/or age.
Abstracts for the papers should be sent by October 17, 2008 to Leigh Goodmark (lgoodmark@ubalt.edu). Abstracts should be no longer than one page. Abstracts for the papers selected to be presented at the conference will be posted on the website and distributed to all presenters and attendees. Working drafts of papers are due no later than February 13, 2009. The working drafts will be posted on the conference website to be shared with other participants and attendees. Materials from last year’s conference can be viewed on our website at http://law.ubalt.edu/femconf/. Finally, please note that a limited amount of money may be available to presenters for travel expenses.
