Margaret Morganroth Gullette
Senexa. The goddess of age studies, whose motto is "End Ageism," is represented as Michelangelo's Libyan Sybil. Her strong shoulders and muscular arms hold a huge open book.
Her skin color and silvery gray hair were conferred by photographers Laura Brody and Fran Forman.
The book that Senexa reads contains the wisdom of ages, collected from the guardians of the life course. The crone-goddess is interrupting her instruction of the children behind her, who reverently discuss anti-ageist lore, in order to cast a deprecating look at the perpetrators of ageism, invisible beneath her feet. Her teachings are dedicated to the agewise.
Essays
“The High Costs of Middle Ageism,” reprinted in Opposing Viewpoints: The Aging Population, ed. Sara Constantakis (Gale, Cengage Learning, 2009). “Society Is Prejudiced Against Aging,” (reprinted in chapter 1 of The Aging Population, ed. Katharine Swarts, Opposing Viewpoints Series. Detroit, MI: Greenhaven Press (Cengage Learning), 2009: 20-26. https://openlibrary.org/books/OL17032117M/The_aging_population
Chapters in books. Chapter of Aged by Culture.
Middle ageism. Political economy. Social issues. Population. Decline narrative.
“No Longer Suppressing Grief: Political Trauma in Twentieth-Century America,” Life Writing 5, Issue 2: “Trauma in the Twenty-First Century,” ed. Kate Douglas and Gillian Whitlock (2008). Published Online: 14 Jan 2009: 253-261. “Gullette's narrative becomes a memoir of growing up in the USA of McCarthy's”--from the Introduction.
Essay.
Politics. History. Emotions. Generational relations. Life writing. Social justice. Trauma. Age autobiography. Memoir.
Honor: Cited as notable in Best American Essays 2009.
“Plastic Surgery (Thankfully) Goes Under the Knife,” WomensENews, November 26, 2008. https://womensenews.org/2008/11/plastic-surgery-thankfully-under-the-knife/
Reprinted by AlterNet without credit under the title “Plastic Surgery Goes the Way of the Ugg Boot.” https://www.alternet.org/2008/12/plastic_surgery_is_going_the_way_of_the_ugg_boot/
Blog.
Women. History. Medicine/surgery. Social pressure. Resistance. Dysfunction industries.
“Aging is NOT a collection of diseases,” WIMNonline.org/WIMNSVoices August 6, 2008.
Blog.
Aged by culture. Medical model
“What’s Age Got to Do With It? My Life in Age Studies,” Coming of Age: First-Generation Critics Reflect on Age, Aging and the Making of Critical Gerontology, edited by Ruth Ray and Thomas R. Cole (Journal of Aging Studies 22 # 2 , Spring 2008).
Chapter in journal/book.
Age autobiography. Age studies.
“Then and Now: What Have the Sexual “Revolutions” Wrought?” Women’s Review of Books, January/February 2008.
Originally called “Youthsex Then and Now.” Revised for Agewise.
Essay.
Sexuality. Youth. Later life. US social history. Men. Gender relations.
"The Contagion of Euphoria," co-winner of the Daniel Singer Millennial Prize, given by the Daniel Singer Foundation, 2008.
Essay.
Nicaragua. Nicaraguan revolution. Poverty alleviation. Socialism. Women. Social justice. Age autobiography. Memoir.
“Hormone Nostalgia: Menopause Discourse After the Debacle,” Women, Wellness, and the Media, ed. Margaret Wiley, Cambridge Scholars Press, 2008.
Chapter in book, invited.
Menopause. Discourse. History.
“Coming of Age: Critical Gerontologists Reflect on Their Own Aging, Age Research, and the Making of Critical Gerontology,” Journal of Aging Studies, 22 #2 ed. Ruth Ray and Thomas Cole (2008).
Chapter in edited collection (invited).
“‘The Xers’ vs. ‘The Boomers’: A Contrived War,” Reprinted in Sociology: Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life. Readings, 6th edition, ed. David M. Newman and Jodi A. O’Brien. Sage Publications: 2006; and 7th edition, 2008.
Chapter of Aged by Culture, reprinted.
Cohort theory. History. Generation X. Boomers.
“Losing Lear, Finding Ageism: The Role of the Gerontological Imagination in the Arts and Humanities,”” Journal of Aging, Humanities, and the Arts 1-2 (2007): 61-69. Published online: 25 June 2007. https://doi.org/10.1080/19325610701410973
Essay, invited.
Shakespeare productions. King Lear. Ageism. Re-reading. Life course developments. Ageism in theater.
Anti-Aging Boom Preys on Jobless Fears at Midlife,” WomensENews, May 2, 2007. https://womensenews.org/2007/05/anti-aging-boom-preys-jobless-fears-at-midlife/
Blog.
Middle Ageism. Midlife unemployment. “Anti-Aging.” Economic anxiety.
“Opciones duras para San Juan del Sur” or “Stark Choices for San Juan del Sur,” El Nuevo Diario (major national newspaper, Nicaragua), February 2007.
Op-ed (Spanish).
Nicaragua.
“Pause for Concern,” American Prospect, January 27, 2007. https://prospect.org/article/pause-concern/
Article.
Menopause. Hormone hysteria.
“Hormone Nostalgia: Estrogen, not menopause, is the public health issue,” American Prospect online, under the title, “Pause for Concern,” January 23, 2007. https://prospect.org/article/just-posted-tap-online-pause-concern./ Revised for Agewise.
Essay.
Hormones. Menopause. Public health. Life course. Sexuality. Dysfunction industries.
“Eye Candy for the Female Gaze,” Women, the Media, Age and Aging, Jan. 12, 2007. http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog/2007/01/12/eye-candy-for-the-female-gaze-2/
Blog.
Feminism. Female gaze. Age gaze. Gender relations.
“The High Costs of Middle Ageism,” reprinted in Inequalities: Readings in Diversity and Social Life, ed. Betsy Lucal and Morton G. Ender. Pearson, 2007. A customizable reader.
Essay in textbook.
Middle ageism. Midlife unemployment. Economic anxiety. Seniority.
“Trapped in American Decline Culture,” Reading Culture: Contexts from Critical Reading and Writing,” 6th edition, ed. Diana George and John Trimbur. Pearson, Longman, 2007. Reprinted from In These Times.
Essay.
US culture. Decline ideology.
“Did You Know? The Older We Get, the Better We Sleep,” Women, the Media, Age and Aging, Dec. 30, 2006. http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog/2006/12/30/best-of-wimns-voices-december-2006/
Blog.
Women. Biological aging. Sleep research.
“Is it Aging or Ageism that Causes the Pain?”, Women, the Media, Age and Aging, October 18, 2006. http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog/?p=291
Reprinted on http://agescan.blogspot.com/2006/11/is-it-aging-or-ageism-that-causes-pain.html
Blog.
Ageism. Biological aging. Social Issues.
“Will It Be Katrina All Over Again?”, Women, the Media, Age and Aging, September 2006. http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog/2006/09/01/will-it-be-katrina-all-over-again/
Blog.
Hurricane Katrina. Women. Age. Social issues.
“Tragic Toll of Age Bias,” Boston Sunday Globe, August 27, 2006. http://globalag.igc.org/armedconflict/countryreports/americas/toll.htm
Op-ed.
Katrina. Hurricane. Ageism.
“Katrina and the Politics of Aging,” There is No Such Thing as a Natural Disaster, ed. Greg Squires and Chester Hartman (New York: Routledge, 2006).
Reprinted on www.Lifewriting.net
Chapter in book. Chapter Eight of Aged by Culture.
Women. African Americans. Katrina. Hurricane. Disaster. Racism. Politics. Income.
“Older Women Were and Are Katrina's Worst Casualty,” WomensENews, December 14, 2005. https://womensenews.org/2005/12/older-women-were-and-are-katrinas-worst-casualty/
Blog. Commentary.
Women. Hurricane Katrina. Disaster. Older adults. Death. Ageism. Racism.
“Take Another Look,” The Our Bodies Ourselves’ Guide to Menopause, ed. The Boston Women’s Health Book Collective (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006). Revised from WomensENews, August 3, 2005.
Article (invited).
Menopause. Aged by culture. Resistance. Social narratives.
“Suppressing Grief: The Politics of ‘McCarthy Era’ Testimonies,” Social Text 23 # 2 (83) (Summer 2005): 109–131. Special Issue of Social Text, ed. Richard Maxwell. https://doi.org/10.1215/01642472-23-2_83-109
Essay (peer-reviewed).
State crime. Politics. History. Testimony. Intergenerational relations. Life writing. Social justice. Family memoir.
Honor: Cited as notable in Best American Essays 2006.
“How the Right Wing Plays the Age Card,” The Nation, October 14, 2004; November 2, 2004. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/playing-age-card/
Article. Adapted from Aged by Culture.
Social Security. Scarcity discourse. Midlife downsizing. Middle ageism. Age-wage curve. Life-course economics.
“Trapped in Decline Culture,” In These Times, November, 2004. http://inthesetimes.com/article/1121/trapped_in_decline_culture
Article. Adapted from Aged by Culture.
Ageism. Life-course narratives. Aging as a narrative. Progress. Decline. Science. Learning ageism.
“Aged by Culture Author ‘Faces’ Children’s Images of Aging,” Aging Today, September/October 2004.
“The New Case for Marriage,” American Prospect 15 #3, March 2004: 48-51. My title: “The New Case for Marriage in the 21st Century USA, Straight and Gay.” https://prospect.org/special-report/new-case-marriage/
Article.
Sexualities. Marriage.
“Mopping Up: Notes from Nicaragua under Neoliberalism,” Yankee Radical, March 2004. http://www.dsaboston.org/yradical/yr2004-03.pdf
Article in the Democratic Socialists of America newsletter.
Nicaragua. Neoliberalism. Nicaraguan history. Autobiography.
“The Sartre-De Beauvoir ‘Conversations’ of 1974: From Life Storytelling to Age Autobiography,” Writing Old Age, ed. Julia Johnson (London: Centre for Policy on Ageing, Centre for Ageing and Biographical Studies, of the Open University, January 2004. The Representation of Older People in Ageing Research Series, No 3): 64-79.
To order: www.central books.co.uk or www.cpa.org.uk/pubs/orderform.html
Essay (invited).
Life storytelling. Age autobiography. Jean Paul Sartre. Progress narrative. Older adults.
“This Long Silence,” PEN America, A Journal for Writers and Readers 5 #3 (Special Issue on “Silences”), Spring 2004.
Essay.
Grief. Autobiography. Family.
“The Broken Shovel: Co-parenting from a Postmaternal Perspective,” Motherhood to Mothering: The Legacy of Adrienne Rich’s Of Woman Born, ed. Andrea O’Reilly (SUNY, 2004): 175-190. A volume of the Association for Research on Mothering.
Chapter in book (invited).
Age autobiography. Parenting. Marriage. Motherhood. Mothering. Mothers and sons. Postmaternity.
“Acting Age on Stage,” Journal of Theater and Dramatic Criticism, Dec. 2003.
Lecture. Essay (invited). Chapter Nine of Aged by Culture.
Acting younger. Acting older. Acting one’s age. Default body. Theater. Performance. Theory.
“Can American Culture Catch Up to the Wonderful Midlife Mother? Postmaternal Characters in Contemporary Culture,” Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering (JARM) 5 #1 (Spring 2003).
Essay.
Postmaternity. Women at Midlife. US Culture. Life course narratives.
“From Life Story-telling Toward Age Autobiography,” Fashioning Age: Cultural Narratives of Later Life, ed. Teresa Mangum, a special issue of the Journal of Aging Studies 17 #1 (Spring 2003): 101-111. DOI: 10.1016/S0890-4065(02)00093-2
Paper originally presented to Conference on Later Life, Obermann Center, University of Iowa, July 1999. For Aged by Culture.
Essay in edited collection (invited).
Life writing. Age autobiography. Life-course narratives.
“What to Do When Being Aged by Culture: Hidden Narratives from the Twentieth-Century Hormone Debacle,” Listening to Older People’s Stories, ed. Anne M. Wyatt-Brown. Special issue of Generations XXVII #3 (fall 2003): 71-76.
Essay (invited).
Aged by culture. Menopause. Hormone era. Social history. Social narratives. Science studies.
“Listening to Older People’s Stories,” special issue of Generations 27 # 3 (2003).
Essay (invited).
Life-course narratives. Older adults. Story-telling.
“Postmaternity as a Revolutionary Feminist Concept,” Feminist Studies 28 # 3 (Fall 2002): 553-572.
Essay.
Postmaternity. Feminism. Motherhood. Life-course narrative. Theory.
“On Dying Young,” www.Salon.com/life, November 11, 2001; excerpted in Human Values in Aging, ed. Harry Moody, November 20, 2001; reprinted in Aging and Spirituality.
Blog.
Dying. Life-course narratives.
“‘Xers’ vs. ‘Boomers’: A Contrived War,” Review of Education/ Pedagogy/ Cultural Studies, Fall 2001. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41213007?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents
Shorter version without footnotes appeared in American Scholar, April 2000. Revised for Aged by Culture.
Essay. Article. Lecture. Book chapter.
Generational warfare. Cohort theory. History.
“The American Dream as Life-Course Narrative,” Profession 2001: pp. 99-108. Revised for Aged by Culture.
Essay for Modern Language Association journal.
US. political economy. Life-course narratives. Life-course economics. Progress. Decline. Middle ageism.
“Age and Life Writing,” Encyclopedia of Life Writing, ed. Margaretta Jolly, London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2001.
Encyclopedia entry.
Life Writing. Age. Gender.
EAT! The Brochure. Accompanied Deborah Fortson’s play, EAT. Funded by Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities, 2001.
Illustrated brochure.
Women. Art. Photography. Eating disorders. Older women. Younger women.
“Television/Radio; Why America Has to Judge Amy's Mother,” New York Times Arts and Leisure section, April 2, 2000. https://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/02/arts/television-radio-why-america-has-to-judge-amy-s-mother.html?searchResultPosition=1
Article. My title, “Judging Amy’s Mother, or Matrophobia Lives.”
TV critique. Matrophobia. Mother-daughter relations.
“Wicked Powerful: The Postmaternal in Contemporary Film and Psychoanalytic Theory,” and “Response,” Gender and Psychoanalysis, #5 (Spring 2000): 107-139 and comment by Carolyn Stack, 149-154.
Essay (invited).
Psychoanalysis. Feminism. Theory. Film. Power. Gender. Postmaternity. Matrophobia.
“My Kingdoms,” Special Issue: Secret Places of Childhood, ed. Elizabeth Goodenough. Michigan Quarterly Review, 2000.
Essay.
Memoir. Nature. Childhood.
“Age Studies, and Gender,” Encyclopedia of Feminist Theories, ed. Lorraine Code (New York: Routledge, 2000).
Encyclopedia entry, invited.
Age studies. Gender. Theory.
“The End of the Workday--II,” reprinted in Aging in America, ed. Olivia J. Smith (New York: H. W. Wilson, 2000). https://www.questia.com/magazine/1G1-20133175/the-end-of-the-workday-ii-discrimination-against Originally in the Nation and the Boston Globe.
Op-ed.
Middle Ageism. Seniority. Discrimination. Political economy.