Publication date:
31 May 2012Length of book:
158 pagesPublisher
Lexington BooksISBN-13: 9780739172506
The Supreme Court is one of the most traditional institutions in America that has been an exclusively male domain for almost two hundred years. From 1981 to 2010, four women were appointed to the Supreme Court for the first time in U.S. history. The Rhetoric of Supreme Court Women: From Obstacles to Options, by Nichola D. Gutgold, analyzes the rhetoric of the first four women elected to the Supreme Court: Sandra Day O’Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. Gutgold’s thorough exploration of these pioneering women’s rhetorical strategies includes confirmation hearings, primary scripts of their written opinions, invited public lectures, speeches, and personal interviews with Justices O’Connor, Ginsburg, and Sotomayor. These illuminating documents and interviews form rhetorical biographies of the first four women of the Supreme Court, shedding new light on the rise of political women in the American judiciary and the efficacy of their rhetoric in a historically male-dominated political system. Gutgold’s The Rhetoric of Supreme Court Women provides valuable insight into political communication and the changing gender zeitgeist in American politics.
Gutgold (communication arts and sciences, Penn State Lehigh Valley) shows how the rhetoric of the four women who have served on the US Supreme Court parallels the history and treatment of women in the US generally and in law schools and the legal profession more specifically. Just as women politicians and women in general no longer have to address the novelty of their gender, the women of the Supreme Court have gradually come to that same place. The pioneers, Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, both experienced serious discrimination, which their rhetoric mirrors by frequently weaving stories of discrimination and progress into their speeches and opinions. The most recent two women justices, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, came of age at a more enlightened, though certainly not perfect, time when women were common in law schools as students, professors, and deans, and were treated more equally in the profession. Their rhetoric mirrors that experience in the same way that O'Connor's and Ginsburg's mirror theirs. Brief biographical sketches of each of the justices work to solidify the book's interest and usefulness. Summing Up: Highly recommended.