FEMINIST JUDGMENTS: HEALTH LAW REWRITTEN

Seema Mohapatra MD Anderson Foundation Endowed Professor in Health Law Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law

Published in December 2022, FEMINIST JUDGMENTS: HEALTH LAW REWRITTEN proposes an alternate history of health law by rewriting key judicial opinions from a feminist perspective. Each chapter includes a rewritten opinion penned by a leading scholar, relying exclusively on court precedents and scientific understanding available at the time of the original decision, and accompanied by commentary from an expert placing the case in historical context and explaining how the feminist judgment might have shaped a different path for subsequent developments.

FEMINIST JUDGMENTS provides a map of the health law field—where paternalism, individualism, gender stereotypes and tensions over the public-private divide shape decisions about informed consent, medical and nursing malpractice, the relationships among health care professionals and the institutions where they work, end-of-life care, reproductive health care, biomedical research, ownership of human tissues and cells, the influence of religious directives on health care standards, health care discrimination, long-term care, private health insurance, Medicaid coverage, the Affordable Care Act, and more.

The book is timely given the way judicial opinions have threatened and are continuing to threaten reproductive health care. Professor Mohapatra will situate the themes in the book alongside the recent and current court battles for reproductive health care access.

Professor Mohapatra’s research centers around health care equity, the intersection of biosciences and the law, assisted reproduction and surrogacy, reproductive justice and public health law. In addition to being the co-editor of FEMINIST JUDGMENTS (with Lindsay F. Wiley) (Cambridge University Press 2022), she also is a co-author of the third edition of REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES AND THE LAW (with Judith Daar, I. Glenn Cohen and Sonia Suter) (Carolina Academic Press 2022). Professor Mohapatra’s work also has been published in various top law reviews, including the Emory Law Journal, University of Colorado Law Review, Harvard Law & Policy Review, and the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law & Ethics, and numerous peer reviewed journals, such as the Hastings Center Report.

Professor Mohapatra serves on the board of directors of the American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics and the ethics advisory committee at the UNMC Global Center for Health Security. She also co-chairs the Health Justice: Engaging Critical Perspectives in Health Law and Policy Initiative. She is a frequent national speaker and often consulted by the media about a wide variety of health law and bioethical topics.

Professor Mohapatra earned her JD from Northwestern University, her master’s in public health with a concentration in chronic disease epidemiology from Yale University, and her BA in natural sciences from Johns Hopkins University. Prior to entering academia, she practiced health law in Chicago at Foley & Lardner and Sidley Austin.

Please register by April 5, 2023. The event will be presented in person and online. Online participants will receive a link to view the presentation just ahead of the event.

No proof of vaccination is required of in-person guests and masks are optional.  However, DePaul is a mask-friendly university, and wearing a mask is highly recommended for all indoor spaces. These rules are subject to change in accordance with public health guidance. 

DePaul College of Law is an accredited MCLE provider. This event is eligible for up to 1 CLE credit hour.