Lectures on Tap - 1950s USA: The Lavender Scare & the Birth of the "Closet"

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🧠 Lecture: "1950s USA: The Lavender Scare & the Birth of the 'Closet'"

🎤 Speaker: Dr. Hannah Leffingwell

Join us for a powerful evening as historian Dr. Hannah Leffingwell uncovers the little-known history of the Lavender Scare and the origins of the modern “closet.” Between 1948 and 1973, thousands of gay men and lesbians were surveilled, investigated, and fired from federal jobs, their lives upended by a state campaign to regulate sexuality and gender under the guise of national security.

Dr. Leffingwell will explore how this federal witch hunt paralleled the Red Scare, why Senator McCarthy and his allies targeted queer Americans, and how the Lavender Scare helped cement queer people’s status as second-class citizens. She will trace how the metaphor of “the closet” emerged from this climate of fear, secrecy, and coerced heterosexual performance—and what this history reveals about American citizenship, authoritarianism, and scapegoating.

Dr. Hannah Leffingwell is a writer, historian, and educator specializing in queer and gender history, lesbian culture, and contemporary LGBTQ+ and feminist movements. She teaches at The New School and the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, and her work appears in Gender & History, Jacobin, The Chronicle Review, and more.

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