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CSW Policy Brief Series 2020 Presents Confronting the Carceral State: Reimagining Justice

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In 2019, the UCLA Center for the Study of Women (CSW) collected Policy Briefs on the theme “Confronting the Carceral State, Reimagining Justice.” The call for submissions was developed by CSW Director Grace Hong and the Black Feminism Initiative Director Sarah Haley. The review committee included Erwin Chemerinsky (Dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law), Amy Ritterbusch (UCLA Department of Social Welfare, Luskin School of Public Affairs), Stephanie Davidson (UCLA School of Law), and Dylan Rodríguez (UC Riverside Department of Media and Cultural Studies).

Six briefs were collected from UC graduate students and system-impacted individuals:

Editor: Katja Antoine, Program and Research Developer, CSW

To download the complete set of policy briefs, click HERE.

To learn more about CSW’s policy briefs, click HERE.

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A New Perspective on Gender Neutrality…Continued

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UCLA professors Abigail C. Saguy and Juliet A. Williams recently published a piece in the Scientific American titled, “Why We Should All Use They/Them Pronouns.” They sparked a conversation around the idea that gendered identifiers can lead to more bias and discrimination, so instead, maybe we should all use gender neutral pronouns: they/them. This article received a range of responses, which led to a follow-up piece written in the Scientific American by Drs. Saguy and Williams as well as Drs. Robin Dembroff (Yale University) and Daniel Wodak (University of Pennsylvania).

Their article, “We Should All Use They/Them Pronouns…Eventually,” responds to critics who may not fully understand the recommendation to why gender-neutral language should be universal. The authors further explain their research and perspectives by countering critiques that bring up concerns addressing gender equality, gender justice, gendered language, Western-centric language, trans perspective, misgendering, grammatical gender and how gendering avoidance can be a form of violence.

The authors realize that moving towards using gender-neutral pronouns will not happen overnight, however, as we begin to comprehend the importance of the change to use gender-neutral pronouns as default, then we can truly move closer to gender equality. To read more details about the significance of gender neutrality, click HERE.

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