UNTIL THE 1970s, SEXUAL harassment was a problem without a name. The term sexual harassment was first used by Lin Farley in a 1974 course on women and work at Cornell University. The first people to define sexual harassment for study were Farley's associates, Karen Sauvigné and Susan Meyer, who founded the Working Women United Institute (WWUI) in 1975. Sauvigné and Meyer described sexual harassment as "any repeated and unwanted sexual comments, looks, suggestions, or physical contact that you find objectionable or offensive and that causes you discomfort on the job."

One year later, a Ladies' Home Journal article used more vivid language to describe sexual harassment in the workplace:

A restaurant owner grabs a waitress' rear whenever she passes the cash register. A police officer makes advances to the woman cop with whom he shares a patrol...