Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.csd.uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!aero!jan@orc.olivetti.com
From: jan@orc.olivetti.com (Jan Parcel)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Discrimination studies?
Message-ID: <57397@aerospace.AERO.ORG>
Date: 7 Sep 89 18:09:20 GMT
Sender: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
Reply-To: twinsun!uunet!orc.olivetti.com!jan (Jan Parcel)
Lines: 36
Approved: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
Status: R


My high school daughter has been given a history project, choose one 
of the following statements to prove:

	1. There is still significant institutional discrimination 
	   against minorities in America.

	2. Within the American institutional system, there is no discrimination.

	3. There is still significant institutional discrimination against
	   women in America.

        4. Women and minorities now have an advantage in America.

The teacher specified that individual bigotry was not to be considered
institutional discrimination.  (If this was a college thesis, one could
take the time to prove that individual bigotry is part of the institution,
but it has taken me years to get to the point where I *might* be able to
articulate this to the satisfaction of a *sympathetic* white male.)

My daughter chose #3, and I bought her _FEMINISM__UNMODIFIED_ by
Catherine MacKinnon.  However, after reading the book, I have decided to
use some of her footnotes as sources, but I would rather my daughter did
not read the book before she has had a long-term relationship with a man.
(MacKinnon has a valuable viewpoint, but telling a teenage girl that
sex and battery are the same thing may not help her form a healthy relationship)

My question: are there particularly good sources on this that offer the
sort of statistics that would convince establishment types and young boys
who assume everything is equal except AA?  (Alternative ideology, such as
defining equality of opportunity as including women's concerns such as child 
care, while important to explain to my daughter, rest on more groundwork than 
she is likely to be able to stuff into a report.)

Of course, she will be using the usual library sources and periodicals
references, but does anyone know of a particularly good study or publication?