In March 1996, the Centre for Applied Legal Studies (CALS) at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), convened a workshop entitled "Gender and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission". The result of the workshop was an in-depth submission to the TRC, which warned that by adopting a gender-neutral attitude the Commission would be falling prey to a basic flaw in the truth-finding process, by accepting the premise that abuse and violations of human rights can be gender-neutral. The TRC took this critique seriously and agreed to CALS' proposal for special women's hearings which were subsequently held in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg. Two researchers who helped spearhead this particular discourse are Beth Goldblatt, a researcher in the CALS Gender Research Project, and Sheila Meintjies, a lecturer in Political Studies at Wits. Together they prepared a second submission on the situation of women. Meintjies presented the submission at the special hearing on women.