Agenda: Visiting Speaker Presentation

The Center for Interpretive and Qualitative Research (CIQR) of the McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts, Duquesne University, in conjunction with the Women's and Gender Studies Program, present:

Professor JUDITH STACEY, Professor of Sociology and Professor of Gender and Sexuality at New York University.

Married to the Market? The New Haves and Have Nots of Contemporary
Conjugal Politics

Abstract:

Amidst the overwhelmingly reactionary character of global political, economic, and social trends, the steady gains of international struggles for lesbian and gay marriage rights represent a striking, and unanticipated, anomaly. Focusing on the fractious politics of marriage in the U.S. and drawing from ethnographic research among gay men and their families in Los Angeles, this presentation will examine some of the paradoxical implications of contemporary transformations of intimacy. Under privatization, marriage has become a luxury good as well as a mechanism for reproducing class and racial inequalities. Thus, although the specter
of same-sex marriage currently polarizes the electorate in the U.S. and serves as a wedge issue for right-wing interests, legalizing same-sex marriage may ultimately prove a greater boon to conservative than progressive
long-term goals.

Followed by a reception. Parking is available in the Forbes Lot located on Forbes Avenue between Magee Street and Washington Place.

SYMPOSIUM: "The Families of Man: Gay Male Intimacy and Kinship in a Global Metropolis"
Feb. 6th (Fri), 10am-12pm Location: 109 Student Union Building, Duquesne University

Professor Stacey is the author of IN THE NAME OF THE FAMILY: RETHINKING FAMILY VALUES IN A POSTMODERN AGE (Beacon Press, 1996), BRAVE NEW FAMILIES: STORIES OF UPHEAVAL IN LATE TWENTIETH-CENTURY AMERICA (Basic Books 1990; second paperback edition, University of California Press, 1998); PATRIARCHY AND SOCIALIST REVOLUTION IN CHINA (University of California Press, 1983; paperback edition, 1995; winner 1985 American
Sociological Association, Jessie Bernard Award). She is also the co-recipient (with T. Biblarz) of the 2002 Distinguished Article Award, Sex and Gender Section, American Sociological Association, for "(How) Does
the Sexual Orientation of Parents Matter?"Professor Stacey has also commented on family change and politics in the popular media -- from appearances on cores on scores of national, international and local television, radio, and webcast programs to articles in the New York Times, the L.A. Times, the Utne Reader, the Nation, Mother Jones, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Lingua Franca, and many other print media.

Minutes

MINUTES of Feb. 5/6 Meeting: JUDITH STACEY, Professor of Sociology and Professor of Gender and Sexuality at New York University, gave a public lecture, "Married to the Market? The New Haves and Have Nots of Contemporary Conjugal Politics," and, on the following day, a symposium, "The Families of Man: Gay Male Intimacy and Kinship in a Global Metropolis." The public lecture filled a 150 person class room. Stacey's
interesting and politically progressive remarks on the economic and poltical dimensions of gay and lesbian marriage, based on her ethnographic studies, drew questions and comments from different perspectives,
making for an intellectually stimulating evening. The symposium focused more her ethnographic methods and their contribution to interpretive and qualitative research.