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DESCRIPTION:2026 Sex\, Gender\, Sexuality Studies Symposium Lecture by Feli
 cia Kornbluh\, Ph.D \n\nIt has been over ten years since the U.S. Supreme C
 ourt ruled that U.S. states and localities cannot deny citizens access to m
 arriage on the basis of their sex or sexuality. Kornbluh will discuss the r
 oad to the Obergefell decision of 2015 and the road away from it and to our
  own dilemmas. Her focus is the case of Sharon Kowalski\, who became disabl
 ed after her car was hit by a drunk driver. Kowalski's lover\, Sharon Thomp
 son\, worked with public-interest advocates and activists in the lesbian-fe
 minist\, disability\, and gay liberation movements to turn her partner's st
 ruggles into a national cause celebre. Together\, these forgotten activists
  rewrote the U.S. constitution from the ground up. But they left parts of t
 he work undone. Kornbluh's lecture will chronicle forgotten chapters of the
  struggle for same-sex marriage rights. And she will gather pieces of the L
 GBT+\, disability\, and health-care agenda that were left on the editing-ro
 om floor by activists from the 1980s through the early 2000s.  \n\nFelicia 
 Kornbluh (she/they) is an historian of 20th and 21st-century U.S. politics.
  She is a Professor of History\, Director of Jewish Studies\, and affiliate
 d faculty member in Gender\, Sexuality\, and Women’s Studies and Law and So
 ciety at the University of Vermont.  She has authored or coauthored dozens 
 of articles and three books\, most recently the award-winning A Woman’s Lif
 e is a Human Life: My Mother\, Our Neighbor\, and the Journey from Reproduc
 tive Rights to Reproductive Justice (Grove Press\, 2023).  Kornbluh co-edit
 ed (with Marie-Amélie George) “Queer U.S. Constitutional History\,” a 5-ess
 ay symposium in the Journal of American Constitutional History and was prim
 ary author of the symposium introduction.  With George\, they also organize
 d a conference on Queer Legal History and are currently at work on an edite
 d collection on the same subject. \n\nIn 2025-26\, Kornbluh is the sole hol
 der of the Martin Duberman Fellowship in LGBTQ+ history at the New York Pub
 lic Library\, where they are researching the pre-history of modern LGBTQ+ r
 ights\, from the standpoint of the nearly forgotten cause célèbre from the 
 1980s and early 1990s over the legal case In re Guardianship of Sharon Kowa
 lski. \n\nKornbluh writes a Substack newsletter titled “History Teaches . .
  . \,” which brings historical knowledge into dialogue with contemporary po
 litics\, and publishes regularly for Ms.com and The American Prospect\, and
  diverse journals including The New York Review of Books\, Journal of Ameri
 can History\, Washington Post\, New York Times Book Review\, Atlantic\, Tim
 e.com\, and The Forward.  She chairs the board of the Planned Parenthood of
  Vermont Action Fund and the Projects and Proposals Committee of the Americ
 an Society for Legal History.
DTEND:20260306T023000Z
DTSTAMP:20260417T004141Z
DTSTART:20260306T013000Z
GEO:45.480964;-122.630146
LOCATION:Vollum College Center\, Vollum Lecture Hall
SEQUENCE:0
SUMMARY:Feminism and Gay Rights\, Disability and Law\, Activism and Nationa
 l Policy Change: The Constitution of Sharon Kowalski
UID:tag:localist.com\,2008:EventInstance_51993981059735
URL:https://events.reed.edu/event/2026-SGS-Symposium
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