Award-Winning Journalist Lorraine Dusky To Speak At UB “Sisters In Law” Conference

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Award-winning journalist Lorraine Dusky will present the keynote address as part of a special centennial conference, "Sisters in Law: A Century of Achievement at UB," sponsored by the UB Law School.

Dusky will present her talk, titled "Still Unequal: The Shameful Truth About Women and Justice in America," from 9:20-10 a.m. Oct. 22 in the Buffalo/Niagara Marriott, 1340 Millersport Highway, Amherst.

She is the author of the 1996 book by the same name, an eye-opening investigation of the nation's legal system and how, at almost every turn, it undermines women's progress.

"In ways you do not even realize, the legal system in this country continues to penalize women -- white, black, yellow and brown -- simply because they are women," Dusky says. "Yes, we have made progress, yes, there have been reforms over the centuries, but we still have a long way to go because the legal system in this country was devised by affluent men for affluent men. We still are beggars wherever justice is dispensed."

In her book, she documents the explicit connection between discrimination in the profession and discrimination in the courts, as well as the professional difficulties and discrimination that cause up to 50 percent of women to leave the field within five years.

According to Dusky, the legal profession has discriminated against women from the time of the first written laws to today in law schools, where women still face prejudice as students and law professors.

"Many of the books law students read today are full of attitudes and stereotypes we thought went out with corsets, or at least hula hoops," she says. "But many in this generation of law professors feel quite comfortable teaching law with the same biases they learned 30 years ago. In many schools, we are training a new generation of lawyers -- and future judges -- how to dispense the law so that it seems fair when, in actuality, it is deeply biased against half the world's population."

Dusky is a former senior editor of Working Woman and a former columnist for Glamour, and has written for publications that include The New York Times, Newsweek and Cosmopolitan. In addition to "Still Unequal," she is author of "The Best Companies for Women." Her honors include an Exceptional Merit Media Award (EMMA) from the National Women's Political Caucus.

For more information about the conference, contact Mary Ann Rogers at 645-2113 or by email at marogers@acsu.buffalo.edu.