A look at how women are seduced and betrayed by our top law schools, by Clinton's controversial ex-nominee for assistant attorney general for civil rights Guinier (Law/Univ. of Penn.; The Tyranny of the Majority, 1994) and two colleagues. Although women are matriculating at America's law schools in record numbers, they consistently underperform compared to their male classmates. According to this study of 981 male and female students at the elite University of Pennsylvania Law School between 1987 and 1992, female law students receive lower grades, achieve lower class ranks, earn fewer awards and honors, and take less prestigious jobs than males. Even more troubling, the women law students interviewed by Guinier, et al., report that the culture of law school, which ``emphasizes aggressiveness, legitimizes emotional detachment and demands speed,'' robs them of their ``voices,'' alienates and demoralizes them, and even endangers their mental health (as one woman put it: ``Guys think law school is hard, and we just think we're stupid''). The authors come down particularly hard on the so-called ``Socratic method'' used in most law school teaching; the ``ritualized combat'' of the technique silences many women whose learning styles are better suited to the cooperative environment of smaller-scale seminars, and teaches little more than ``how to ask rude questions.'' This brief study is hugely persuasive but sometimes a bit vague: Exactly what are the career options available to J.D.s who refuse to ask ``rude questions''? Exactly what are the long-term effects of three miserable postgraduate years? Occasionally, the focus is too narrow; for example, is it possible that women law graduates fail to take public-interest jobs not because they've been coopted by macho, corporate-friendly law-school culture, but because they need lucrative jobs to pay off staggering law-school debts? Despite the sometimes conclusory nature of the analysis, an important and startling work by a provocative national figure. (Author tour)
Pub Date: April 7, 1997
ISBN: 0-8070-4404-0
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Beacon Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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