Livia Gershon
Queerty
Nashua, NH, United States
Contact Livia
Discover and connect with journalists and influencers around the world, save time on email research, monitor the news, and more.
| Recent: |
|
| Past: |
|
Past articles by Livia:
Rediscovering the “gay lifestyle” through 1970s smut magazines
The gay men’s magazines QQ and Ciao! were unabashedly liberated, but they still catered to an exclusive audience... → Read More
Gatekeeping Psychology
In the mid-twentieth century, psychologist Edwin Boring attributed the limited role of female psychologists to issues other than discrimination. → Read More
The Long Life of the Nacirema
An article that turned an exoticizing anthropological lens on US citizens in 1956 began as an academic in-joke but turned into an indictment of the discipline. → Read More
The Colonial History of the Telegraph
Gutta-percha, a natural resin, enabled European countries to communicate with their colonial outposts around the world. → Read More
Opium’s History in China
Opium has been used as a medicinal and recreational substance in China for centuries, its shifting meanings tied to class and national identity. → Read More
Abstinence By Juramentos
Long before Dry January became a thing, Mexicans were using a similar program of temporary abstinence based on a pledge to the Virgin of Guadalupe. → Read More
Creating the “Criminal Class”
In the late eighteenth century, Glasgow magistrate Patrick Colquhoun argued that immoral living had created a distinct class of people with weak characters. → Read More
Who Was Jesus’s Grandma?
Canonical scripture never mentions the parents of the Virgin Mary, but the body of St. Anne was vital to Christianity in the Middle Ages and Renaissance. → Read More
Books on the Battlefield
During World War II, GIs battled boredom with novels provided by the Armed Service Division, raising questions about the “feminizing” effect of reading. → Read More
A Cigarette-Eye View of US History
The big story for cigarettes in the twentieth century was their journey from popularity to pariah. → Read More
Whatever Happened to the Open Internet?
There may be a way out of corporate control of the internet, but it probably starts with money. → Read More
When Lodgers Were “Evil”
A wave of immigration from eastern and southern Europe transformed urban landscapes, creating crowded tenements that stoked humanitarian concerns. → Read More
Respecting the Potato
Cuzco’s Potato Park conserves biodiversity and strengthens food sovereignty, all while emphasizing respect for this important and charismatic crop. → Read More
Remembering the Mirabal Sisters
International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women honors three sisters who were murdered by the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. → Read More
The Swedish-American Coffee Tradition
For many Swedish immigrants to the United States, coffee was a key to hospitality and a way to signal prosperity. → Read More
The Teyollohcuani: Cosmopolitan Vampire Witch
When different cultures meet, their languages, foods, and songs mix and change—and so do their monsters. → Read More
Scandal at the YMCA
Troubles grew at the Portland institution when one of its older residents attempted to poison himself after being questioned by police about same-sex relations. → Read More
The Letter That Helped Start a Revolution
The Town of Boston’s invention of the standing committee 250 years ago provided a means for building consensus during America’s nascent independence movement. → Read More
Why Learn to Read?
The value placed on literacy has changed over time, shifting from a nineteenth-century moral imperative to a twentieth-century production necessity. → Read More
The Story Behind “This is Your Brain on Drugs”
How did the campaign behind the Partnership for a Drug Free America’s iconic commercials develop, and why were its products so memorable? → Read More