Friday, September 27 2024, 12:40 - 1:30pm Miller Learning Center, Room 248 Friday Speaker Series Katherine Sobering Sociology and Women's and Gender Studies University of North Texas Katherine Sobering, Sociologist Dr. Katherine Sobering (she/ her) is a queer parent and ethnographer who studies how inequalities are produced and disrupted in everyday life. Sobering is an assistant professor of Sociology and a faculty affiliate in Women's and Gender Studies at the University of North Texas. Her research on work, politics, and social change has been supported by the Fulbright Program and the National Science Foundation. This lecture will focus on her ongoing Queer Birth Project, which explores the unique physical, emotional, legal, and psychological challenges that are imposed by mainstream society on LGBTQIA+ parents and families. The Queer Birth Project: Feminist Interdisciplinary Methods and LGBTQ+ Family-Building in the 21st Century In 1981, feminist artist Judy Chicago asked: “How do women feel about all aspects of birth?” In the resulting Birth Project (1980-85), Chicago created a series of artwork that celebrated “the birth-giving capacity of women along with their creative spirit.” Drawing on interdisciplinary and collaborative methods at the intersection of the arts and social sciences, this project revisits and reframes this question forty years later to examine LGBTQ+ experiences of childbirth and family formation in the 21st century. K Sobering FSS Flyer (2.53 MB)
