Making a Case for Teaching Caste and Gender in Law Schools

Abstract

This article argues for mainstreaming of caste and gender as subject matter in legal education in India. Justice education in any country ought to introduce students to the main axis of oppression, historical patterns of discrimination in their society—in the United States, it is race and patriarchy; in India, it is caste patriarchy. The article connects the denial of justice in caste crimes to the invisibility of caste in the legal discourse and insists that legal education is the key to making caste and gender visible within the legal machinery. For this purpose, the article examines how critical race and feminist theory informed law school education in the United States. It also elucidates the efforts of making legal education inclusive and reflective through the national law schools experiment in India. Lastly, it suggests ways in which caste and gender can be included in law school curricula.