History of Science and Medicine / McGovern Lecture: "Born this Way: Genetics, Activism, and the 'Gay Gene' in the United States"

McGOVERN LECTURE  
In this talk Professor Alexandra Minna Stern shares preliminary research related to her new book project on the genesis and ramifications of the "gay gene," which, despite not existing, was "discovered" in 1993 by a geneticist, and soon undergirded political debates about LGBT rights.  Right now she is tracing the genetics (esp. twin studies), and is interested in how the "gay gene" becomes a legible and contested scientific construct in the 1990's.