Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Women's Studies
About
Anna Kirkland is the Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Women's Studies. She holds courtesy appointments in Political Science, Sociology, and Health Management and Policy. Professor Kirkland earned her J.D. (2001) and Ph.D. (Jurisprudence and Social Policy, 2003) from the University of California, Berkeley. Primarily situated in the law and society tradition, Professor Kirkland also works within science studies, disability studies, and gender studies using theoretical, qualitative, and interpretive methods. Prof. Kirkland is the author of two books: Vaccine Court: The Law and Politics of Injury, New York University Press (2016), and Fat Rights: Dilemmas of Difference and Personhood, New York University Press (2008). She is the co-editor with Jonathan Metzl of Against Health: How Health Became the New Morality, New York University Press, (2010). Her published articles analyze topics such as the politics of vaccines in state legislatures, scientific credibility and vaccine criticism, rights consciousness in the fat acceptance movement, the environmental approach to anti-obesity policy, and transgender discrimination as sex discrimination.
Professor Kirkland is currently working on a new project funded by the National Science Foundation on the Affordable Care Act's Section 1557 ban on sex discrimination in health care settings. She teaches courses on gender, health, politics and law.
