The origins of the Feminist Legal Research Unit lay in Anne Morris and Sue Nott's course on Women and the Law (and their early book in this area) and it was formally recognised as a cluster in 1993. From being a very ‘ground up’ informal arrangement which sought to carve out space to discuss feminist issues, it then started to gain a strong national reputation, truly blazing the trail for feminist legal scholarship.
The cluster advertised its annual seminar series programme in Feminist Legal Studies, hosting many high profile guest speakers including Carol Smart, Kamlesh Bahl, Helena Kennedy, Joanne Conaghan, Lois Bibbings, Jo Bridgeman, Sue Millns, Sally Sheldon, Jo Shaw, Aileen McColgan & Anne Bottomley. Notable seminar series included ‘Feminist Perspectives on Employment Law’; ‘Well Women: the gendered nature of health care provision’ and ‘women in wealth’ and ‘Making Ourselves Heard! Women in the Decision making Process in Europe’. All of which are themes which continue to be reflected in Feminist Scholarship to this day, not least in the work undertaken by current FRAN members.
Overtime, these seminars inspired the move from the cluster publishing its own Working Papers series to publishing books with established publishers, not least ‘Law and Body Politics’ amongst others.
The Unit also made responses to both the parliamentary consultation document on consent to life-prolonging treatments (House of Lords Select Committee on Medical Ethics, 1993) and the HFEA Public Consultation Document, Donation Ovarian Tissue in Embryo Research and Assisted Conception.’
Watch a video
Anne Morris and Professor Anu Arora talk about being women academics at Liverpool back in the 1980s.
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