Women's and Children's Advocacy Project

Faculty and students engage in projects aimed at the protection of victims of domestic and sexual violence and also serve as legal advocates on behalf of children. These efforts have included the development of three public-access informational Web sites.

2007 Report of Activities

  • The Project runs two online information services. The Sexual Violence Legal News (SVLN) provides online summaries of recent, important cases relating to sexual violence. It also has an email service for subscribers to alert them to the posting of new information. The Judicial Language Project (JLP), the only one of its type in the country, monitors cases related to sexual violence for language that stereotypes, demeans, or otherwise inappropriately characterizes the victims of the violence. The JLP is aimed at influencing the language of judicial opinions. Both SVLN and JLP are staffed by students at the New England School of Law.
  • The Project's 2006 study of statutory presumptions against awarding custody to perpetrators of domestic violence is now available online.
  • The Project sponsored "The Troubling Language of Rape: How Eroticism, Gender Myths, and Victim Blaming Affect Social and Legal Discourse," on Saturday, March 24, 2007, examining the relationship between language and topics such as sexual violence and gender, rape myths, race and rape, and child sexual abuse. Panelists included linguists, social scientists, and legal scholars. A recording on DVD of the conference is available at the New England School of Law Library upon request.

2006 Report of Activities

  • In the Spring of 2006, the Project undertook a nationwide study of statutory presumptions against awarding custody to perpetrators of domestic violence. Massachusetts has such a statute. This has been an area of tremendous discussion in state legislatures and in the public dialogue about families, fathers, and domestic violence. Two state legislators in Massachusetts requested that the Project produce the study so as to provide them with background information for the debate in Massachusetts . The students who worked on the study presented it to the legislators at a meeting in May, 2006.

Students involved with the Women's and Children's Advocacy Project Project are contributing to an alert service, Sexual Violence Legal News Online.

For more information about the Women's and Children's Advocacy Project, contact Associate Dean Judith Greenberg or Adjunct Professor Murphy