Co-sponsored by the Center for European Studies and the George L. Mosse Program in History.
In his book,” Racism and the Making of Gay Rights,” Laurie Marhoefer (Professor, University of Washington) shows how Magnus Hirschfeld laid the groundwork for modern gay rights, and how he did so by borrowing from a disturbing set of racist, imperial, and eugenic ideas. Following Hirschfeld and Li in their travels through the American, Dutch, and British empires, from Manila to Tel Aviv to having tea with Langston Hughes in New York City, and then into exile in Hitler’s Europe, Laurie Marhoefer provides a vivid portrait of queer lives in the 1930s and of the turbulent, often-forgotten first chapter of gay rights.