Media, PA 19063
Biography
Julie Gallagher is a Professor of History and American Studies with affiliate status in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Penn State Brandywine. She received her PhD in History from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, a MA in Education from the University of Michigan, a BA in Economics from Fordham University, and a Certificate in International Relations at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA).
Her book, Reshaping Women’s History: Voices on Nontraditional Women Historians was published by University of Illinois Press in 2018. The book presents autobiographical essays by eighteen accomplished scholar-activists who persevered through poverty or abuse, medical malpractice or family disownment, and civil war. As they illuminate their own unique circumstances, the authors also address issues all too familiar to women in the academy: financial instability, the need for mentors, explaining gaps in resumes, and coping with gendered family demands, biases, and expectations. See details here: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/48dte6fd9780252042003.html
Her book, Black Women and Politics in New York City, was published by the University of Illinois Press in 2012 (reprinted in paperback in 2014). Party politics, American liberalism, the civil rights movement, and the women’s rights movement all look different when considered from the perspective of the women documented in this book. See details here: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/62kxc8yn9780252036965.html
Professor Gallagher’s current book project, “Frontline Battles for Justice in an Age of Universal Human Rights: A Comparative Gender History,” offers new and important insights into the gendered history of civil society organizing from the founding of the United Nations through the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security in 2000. It examines civil society activists in the United States, Northern Ireland, Argentina, and Liberia who challenge repressive leadership and widespread human rights violations by not only engaging in activism in their own countries, but also by mobilizing international forces to support their efforts. As part of her work, she has recently traveled to Liberia and Northern Ireland to interview peace activists.
In addition to her scholarly work, Professor Gallagher has been a long-time human rights advocate, serving as a volunteer legislative advocate with Amnesty International, observing elections in a number of former Soviet countries with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and working with survivors of sexual assault.
Publications
Books:
Reshaping Women’s History: Voices on Nontraditional Women Historians, eds. Julie Gallagher and Barbara Winslow (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, October 2018).
Black Women and Politics in New York City (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, June 2012; paperback 2014).
Current Book Project in Progress:
“Frontline Battles for Justice in an Age of Universal Human Rights: A Comparative Gender History” (working title)
Selected Articles:
“Political Trailblazers: African American Women and Electoral Politics in New York City, 1930s-1950s” in New York Archives (New York: Archives Partnership Trust, Fall 2014).
“How did Shirley Chisholm, the First African American Woman Elected to the U.S. Congress, Advance an Inclusive Feminist Politics in the 1960s and 1970s?” Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000, 17:1 (March 2013).
“The National Council of Negro Women, Human Rights, and the Cold War,” in Breaking the Wave: Feminism in the Mainstream, 1945-1985, eds. Jacqueline Castledine and Kathleen Laughlin (NY: Routledge Press, Fall 2010.)
“Revisiting Constructs and their Tyrannical Inclinations,” Feminist Formations, (formerly National Women’s Studies Association Journal) (Vol. 22, 1, Spring 2010), 81-86.
“African American Women and Power Politics in New York City, 1944-1972,” Journal of Women, Politics & Policy (Fall 2007), 101-130.
“Waging ‘The Good Fight’: The Political Life of Shirley Chisholm, 1953-1982,” Journal of African American History (Summer 2007), 393-416.
Newspaper Articles:
“Block the New Travel Ban,” The Morning Call, March 11, 2017.
“Syrian Refugee Legislation Makes Crisis Worse,” The Morning Call, December 1, 2015.
“Congress Can Take Step to Close Guantanamo Detention Center,” The Morning Call, November 20, 2013.