- Lillian Faderman
Infobox Writer
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name = Lillian Faderman
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birthdate = 1940
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occupation = writer, educator
nationality = American
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website =Lillian Faderman (born 1940) is a scholar whose books on
lesbian relationships in history have earned critical praise and awards. Faderman is a professor of English atCalifornia State University in Fresno, California.Early life
Faderman was raised by her mother, Mary, and her aunt, Rae. In 1923, the two emigrated from a
shtetl inLatvia to the lower east side ofManhattan , hoping to marry well enough to pay for their sisters and brothers to join them in theUnited States . The plan was unsuccessful; the rest of the family was killed duringHitler 's extermination of European Jews, and Mary blamed herself for not sending enough money to rescue them. Her guilt contributed to a serious mental illness that would profoundly affect her daughter.cite news |last=Marler |first=Regina |url=http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1589/is_2003_Feb_18/ai_97726506 |title=Naked History |publisher=The Advocate |date=February 18, 2003 |accessdate=2007-03-21]Mary and Rae, Faderman's mother and aunt, worked in the garment industry for very little money. Lillian was her mother's third pregnancy; her mother aborted the first two pregnancies at her father's request, but insisted on bearing and raising the third. Mary remarried when Lillian was a teenager and died in 1979, continuing to have a profound influence on her daughter’s life.
Coming out
The family moved to
Los Angeles , where with her mother’s encouragement Lillian took acting classes. She began modeling as a teenager, discovered the gay bar scene and met her first girlfriend. Before she graduated from high school, she married a gay man much older than herself, a marriage which lasted less than a year and was mainly done at the insistence of her mother and aunt.cholarship
Faderman studied first at
UCLA and later at theUniversity of California, Berkeley . She is now a professor of English atCalifornia State University, Fresno .Private life
She lives with her partner of thirty years, Phyllis. They have one son, Avrom, who earned a PhD from
Stanford University . * [http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/1121/edition_id/10/format/html/displaystory.html]Awards
*
Stonewall Book Award (1982)
* Lambda Literary Editor's Choice Award (1992)
*Lambda Literary Award for Best Lesbian/Gay Anthology (2003)
*Yale University JamesBrudner Prize for Exemplary Scholarship in Lesbian/Gay Studies (2001)
*Paul Monette Award
* Publishers Triangle Bill Whitehead AwardWorks
* "Gay L. A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics, And Lipstick Lesbians" (2006)
* "Naked in the Promised Land: A Memoir" (2003)
* "To Believe in Women: What Lesbians Have Done For America - A History" (1999)
* "I Begin My Life All Over : The Hmong and the American Immigrant Experience" (1998)
* "Chloe Plus Olivia: An Anthology of Lesbian Literature from the 17th Century to the Present" (1994)
* "Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers : A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America" (1991)
* "Scotch Verdict : Miss Pirie and Miss Woods v. Dame Cumming Gordon" (1983)
* "Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present" (1981)Footnotes
External links
* [http://www.csufresno.edu/journal/vol7/09/newsmakers/LillianFaderman.shtml Award-winner LillianFaderman]
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