Leila J. Rupp


Leila J. Rupp is an American historian, feminist, and professor of Feminist Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is an alumna of Bryn Mawr College, a member of the Seven Sisters women's colleges, where she received her bachelor's degree in 1972 as well as Ph.D. in 1976, both in history. Her areas of interest include women's movements, sexuality, and queer and women's history.
Rupp was a professor of history and women's studies for 25 years at Ohio State, and the university's first faculty member in women's studies, before joining the faculty of University of California, Santa Barbara in 2002.
Rupp is known for her numerous and critically-acclaimed books on women's and queer history and feminist studies, including Survival in the Doldrums, Worlds of Women, A Desired Past, Drag Queens at the 801 Cabaret, and Sapphistries: A Global History of Love Between Women. SFGate described Sapphistries as "a fascinating and at times startling transnational history" that begins in 40,000 B.C. and ends it in modern times. In 2015, Rupp won the prestigious Lambda Literary Award for her co-edited anthology Understanding and Teaching U.S. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender History.
She is coeditor of 5 editions of Feminist Frontiers, a pioneering text in women's, gender, and sexuality studies, and author of numerous articles in feminist studies, history, and social science journals. She was cohost of the podcast, sponsored by the Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance project.
In 2016, the American Historical Association offered the session “Transforming Women’s History: Leila Rupp — Scholar, Editor, and Mentor,” in which five prominent scholars honored Rupp's scholarship by detailing her impact on the field. Rupp was the editor of the Journal of Women's History from 1996 to 2004.
An out lesbian, her partner is Verta Taylor, with whom she coauthored several works.

Publications

Excerpt reprinted in Perspectives on the American Past.