History
The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
and Transgender Studies Certificate Program was approved by the Maryland
Higher Education Commission and endorsed by the University's Board
of Regents in Spring 2002. That milestone is merely the latest evidence
of the University's long-standing commitment to achieving diversity
in both the demographic as well as the educational sense of the word.
The LGBT Studies Program, like the programs and departments in Afro-American
Studies, Asian American Studies, Jewish Studies, Latin-American Studies,
and Women's Studies that preceded it, is part of the institution's
broad and deep effort to transform curricula to reflect new developments
in multicultural scholarship and to provide students with a set of
educational experiences that convey some sense of the diversity of
human cultures. The task of LGBT Studies is to highlight sexuality
and sexual identities as aspects of the diversity of the University
community and of the knowledge generated by our faculty and students.
Courses with significant LGBT content have been
taught at Maryland since the mid-1970s, when Professor Frederick
Suppe first offered "Homosexuality and Morality," which evolved into
the still popular "Gay and Lesbian Philosophy." Throughout the 1970s
LGBT issues were a focus of campus activism. Students filed suit against
the Board of Regents to allow the Homophile Club to remain a recognized
student organization. They also fought to get sexual orientation added
to the University's new Human Relations Code. (The Code was adopted
in 1976. It was modified to include sexual orientation as a category
protected against discrimination in 1998.) A de facto LGBT Studies "program" evolved
over the years as faculty in a range of departments (e.g., Counseling
and Personnel Services, English, Philosophy, and Women's Studies)
developed courses out of their own research in the field. In 1997,
with the establishment of a President's Commission on Lesbian, Gay,
and Bisexual (and later Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) Issues,
momentum developed to formalize the program in order to heighten its
visibility and to allow students to obtain an academic credential for
the work they were doing. A coalition of faculty members from around
the campus--in concert with Luke Jensen, the newly appointed director
of LGBT Equity--worked to develop a proposal for an undergraduate certificate
and to shepherd it through the lengthy process of campus and state
approval. Following final approval in Spring, 2002, Provost William
Destler approved the appointment of Marilee Lindemann, associate professor
of English, as interim director of the LGBT Studies Program. Then in Januray 2005
she was appointed for a 3.5 year term as Director of the program. The program
is administered through the office of the Associate Provost for Academic
Affairs and Dean of Undergraduate Studies. The first certificate in
LGBT Studies was awarded to Michelle Kendrick, a Women's Studies major,
who graduated in Spring, 2002 and fulfilled all the requirements for
the certificate just days after it was approved.
As of Spring, 2007 a total of 19 students have earned certificates
in LGBT Studies. Representing the range of appeal for such an interdisciplinary
undergraduate certificate, certificate students' majors include Anthropology,
Communications, Criminal Justice, Economics, English, Family Studies,
Government and Politics, History, Philosophy, Psychology, Sociology,
and Women's Studies.
