To books in two years Part 1 (Visayan Daily Star)

Two books in two years
Part 1

I am, as Atty. Lorna Kapunan would say, “back to the human race” after the launch of two books of the University of the Philippines Center for Women’s Studies Foundation Inc. which I co-authored with some of the most talented people in the world. Engendering the Philippine Judiciary, supported by the UN Development Fund for Women-Bangkok, is by Rowena Guanzon, Aurora de Dios, Damcelle Torres and Theresa Balayon. The Davide Court: Its Contributions to Gender and Women’s Rights, is authored by Rowena Guanzon, Nicolas Pichay, Juline Dulnuan, Cecilia Papa, and Damcelle Torres.

Nicolas Pichay is my dear friend Nick, two-time Palanca Awardee, poet and playwright by night and lawyer by day. In The Davide Court, all authors except for UP Prof. Dulnuan are lawyers (all from U.P), but she survived months of unjust vexation. One more month and she would have sought an injunction against us.

Atty. Cecilia Papa, my sorority sister, is a practicing lawyer and professor in Adamson University College of law. Aurora de Dios is former Dean of Miriam College, Theresa Balayon, an Ilongga, coordinates the Raquel Edralin-Tiglao Institute for Family Violence Prevention of the Women’s Crisis Center. Lawyer Damcelle Torres was formerly the youth commissioner of the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women.

Lucy Lazo and Sheila Coronel, my friends who encouraged me to write the books, say that writing a book is like birthing. Although we experience birthing only vicariously, they are right. I feel like I carried those books around in my head for more than 9 months, and after two years, at last, they are out, with twelve fingers and twenty toes. The books are now available in the UP Center for Women’s Studies.

To the survivors of violence against women, thank you for trusting us with your stories. To all those who contributed ideas, opinions, experiences, those who gave us encouragement, and to the people who were the “wind beneath our wings,” thank you. Without your help we would not have been able to finish these books. Salamat.

Engendering the Philippine Judiciary

In 2004, the UP Center for Women’s Studies, the UP Center for Women’s Studies Foundation, Inc., and the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women, with the support of the United Nations Development Fund for Women-Bangkok, launched the 1st Gender Justice Awards to recognize judges who rendered gender-sensitive decisions in cases of violence against women and girl-children. Cited as the Most Outstanding Judge was Ma. Nimfa Penaco Sitaca of the Regional Trial Court of Oroquieta City.

The Gender Justice Awards aims to highlight the need for a gender-responsive judiciary in order to achieve the goal of eliminating violence against women.

As part of the Gender Justice Awards project, the UP Center for Women’s Studies Foundation, Inc. and UNIFEM-Bangkok is publishing a book entitled Engendering the Philippine Judiciary, authored by Rowena V. Guanzon, Aurora Javate-de Dios, Damcelle Torres, and Theresa Balayon. Engendering the Philippine Judiciary hopes to raise the awareness of judges and justices on gender and the use of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in judicial practice. It also hopes to contribute to the development of legal theory and gender-fair jurisprudence.

More than documenting the Gender Justice Awards as an advocacy and enabling strategy for judicial reform, the book discusses the problem of gender discrimination in the courts and offers gender analyses as a tool for judges. It also includes the use of the CEDAW in Philippine jurisprudence and in other jurisdictions, and case digests of Supreme Court decisions on violence against women.

The Davide Court: Its Contributions to Gender and Women’s Rights

“The Davide Court” is a meticulous, comprehensive and fascinating documentation of the extended, complicated and continuing engagement of the Philippine judiciary on one hand and the advocates of womens’ rights, on the other.

Published by the UP Center for Women’s Studies, the book surveys more than a thousand cases penned former Chief Justice Davide and other Justices of the Davide Court from 1998 to 2005 involving, rape, sexual harassment, and other forms of violence against women, child support and other gender issues. It identifies underlying legal principles and personal assumptions used by the Justices of the Supreme Court in deciding the cases; marks shifts in perceptions in the decisions; and points out possible areas of inquiry for legal theorists as well as social anthropologists. More than just a record of jurisprudence, this book is an indispensable guide to advocates of human rights, teachers and students of law, and all those interested in the history of the our Supreme Court.

You may read the books in my website. http://www.bingguanzon.com/books-and-articles-byrowena-v-guanzon/

Please view the photos of the book launch and see how happy former Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, Jr. was.*