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Women in the Barracks: The VMI Case and Equal Rights. By Philippa Strum. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, c. 2002. Pp. x, 417. $34.95, ISBN 0-7006-1164-9.)
Women in the Barracks is many different studies rolled into one. It is a detailed legal history of discrimination against women's entrance into the military, complete with interviews that author Philippa Strum conducted with representatives on both sides of the U.S. Supreme Court's 1996 decision ordering that women be allowed to enroll in the Virginia Military Institute (VMI), including justices of the Court. It is a mini-history of VMI, from its founding in 1839 as an all-male institution to the continuing implications of that foundation through the present. Finally, it is a very brief history of gender roles and relationships in the South and in the United States. Strum's three-pronged approach makes for a much broader contribution...