Portia Hypothesis

Last updated

The Portia Hypothesis claims women with masculine-sounding names will be more successful in the legal profession than an otherwise identical counterpart. The hypothesis is named after William Shakespeare's character from the Merchant of Venice , [1] who disguises herself as a man so she can argue as a lawyer. [2]

Evidence

A study of South Carolina judges by Bentley Coffey (Clemson University, Department of Economics) and Patrick McLaughlin (George Mason University, Mercatus Center) found evidence supporting the hypothesis. [3] [4] [5]

References

  1. ↑ Alter, Adam (29 May 2013). "The Power of Names". The New Yorker . Retrieved 19 October 2018.
  2. ↑ Delistraty, Cody (30 July 2014). "Who Wins in the Name Game?". The Atlantic . Retrieved 19 October 2018.
  3. ↑ Weiss, Debra (3 September 2009). "Female Lawyers with Masculine Names May Have a Better Shot at Judgeships". ABA Journal . Retrieved 19 October 2018.
  4. ↑ Coffey, Bentley; McLaughlin, Patrick (4 August 2009). "Do Masculine Names Help Female Lawyers Become Judges? Evidence from South Carolina". American Law and Economics Review . 11 (1): 112–133. doi: 10.1093/aler/ahp008 .
  5. ↑ "Female lawyers with male names 'more successful'". The Telegraph . 2 November 2009. Retrieved 19 October 2018.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.