(Des)Constituting Gender in the Judiciary

Abstract

(Des)Constituting Gender in the Judiciary
Legal mobilization strategies, using the law as a source of social and political interaction and as a mechanism for legal claims, turned the interests of feminist movements in a «civil rights cause» and contributed to the editing of Maria da Penha Law. Understanding the usage of the term «gender» in the Brazilian Legal System shows that new and different shades are commonly assigned as concepts by the Law. We observe in this article how the concept of gender, «borrowed» from social sciences, moves between the speeches and classification of judicial operators and how it gives them power to constitute, set boundaries and hierarchies in debates about gender in Brazilian Legal System.