Law, Gender, and Sexuality

This course examines legal issues involving sexual orientation, gender identity, and reproductive rights and justice.  LGBTQ and reproductive rights present some of the most hotly contested legal questions of our time, and there has been enormous, highly consequential change in recent years in the way the law regulates people’s gender and sexuality and their reproductive and family lives.  The Supreme Court has issued numerous blockbuster decisions that have changed life on the ground as it is experienced by millions of people, and that have also fundamentally altered the way courts determine what regulation is permissible in the contexts of gender, sexuality, and pregnancy.  This course aims to provide students with a comprehensive doctrinal foundation in LGBTQ and repro law and an understanding of the arguments and scholarship that continue to influence the development of law in these areas.  The course covers the most significant cases that have recently come down in these areas, tracks the latest developments in culture and politics, and tries to understand what all this change means for the future.