Joan C. Williams

Joan C. Williams is a Distinguished Professor of Law, 1066 Foundation Chair, founding Director of the Center for WorkLife Law at University of California, Hastings College of the Law, and Co-Director of the Project on Attorney Retention (PAR). She is a prize-winning author and expert on work/family issues. Her book, Unbending Gender: Why Family and Work Conflict and What to Do About It (Oxford University Press, 2000), won the 2000 Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award. She has authored or co-authored five books and over sixty law review articles.

Referred to as having “something approaching rock star status” in her field by The New York Times Magazine, her article “Beyond the Maternal Wall: Relief for Family Caregivers Who are Discriminated against on the Job,” 26 Harvard Women’s Law Review 77 (2003) (co-authored with Nancy Segal), was prominently cited in Back v. Hastings on Hudson Union Free School District, 2004 U.S. App. Lexis 6684 (2d Cir. April 7, 2004).

Professor Williams has played a central role in organizing social scientists to document maternal wall bias, notably in a special issue of the Journal of Social Issues (2004), co-edited with Monica Biernat and Faye Crosby, which was awarded the Distinguished Publication Award by the Association for Women in Psychology. In 2006, she received the American Bar Association’s Margaret Brent Award for Women Lawyers of Achievement. In 2008, she delivered the Massey Lectures in American Civilization at Harvard University.