Gender Issues and the Prosser, Wade, and Schwartz Torts Casebook

Feminist jurisprudence is burgeoning. During the 1980s, there has been much excellent work in areas such as legal theory and practice, women\u27s legal history, and specific substantive fields of law. Some law faculty also have analyzed gender bias in legal casebooks. Moreover, the eighth edition of William Prosser\u27s renowned Cases and Materials on Torts, the most widely used torts casebook in American law schools, is scheduled for classroom use in the autumn of 1988. All of these developments make this a promising time to consider gender issues and Prosser, Wade, and Schwartz. This paper is meant to begin that discussion and to contribute to the broader work on feminist issues m progress. The first section of the piece affords a general examination of many aspects of the Prosser casebook that involve issues of gender. This overview should enhance the understanding of readers, especially those persons not accustomed to thinking consciously in terms of gender, while providing a setting for the specific assessment in the second segment of the paper. That section explores how issues implicating gender can arise in the classroom context of learning and teaching from Prosser\u27s materials on affirmative causes of action for intentional torts to persons and privileges to those torts. The final part reflects on the future of gender issues and Prosser, Wade, and Schwartz