Lillian Faderman, an internationally known scholar of lesbian and LGBT history and literature, will deliver Emory’s 11th annual Rothschild Lecture on Monday, Nov. 18. Her presentation will center on “Harvey Milk Through a Jewish Lens.”

Harvey Milk, a gay martyr and American icon, spoke often of himself as a “New York Jew.” His self-chosen appellation was intended to be confrontational, but Faderman will trace the ways in which it also told the story of his upbringing, values and deeply emotional identification. 

Elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, Milk was the first openly gay elected official in the state of California and among the first in the nation. He was assassinated along with Mayor George Moscone after less than a year in office; their killer, Dan White, was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to just seven years, sparking massive protests. 

The lecture, sponsored by the Tam Institute for Jewish Studies, will take place at 7:30 p.m. in the Oxford Road Building on Emory’s Atlanta campus, and will be followed by a reception. Copies of Faderman’s award-winning book, “Harvey Milk: His Lives and Death,” will be available for purchase. 

The Rabbi Jacob M. Rothschild Lecture memorializes the late rabbi, civil rights activist and spiritual leader of The Temple, Atlanta’s oldest Jewish congregation. Each year the Rothschild Lecture features a distinguished speaker on a topic related to social justice and Judaism.

The lecture and reception are free and open to the public. It is co-sponsored by the Hightower Fund; the Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry; the Department of Religion; Department of Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies; the Department of History; the Department of Middle Eastern and South Asian studies; and the Office of LGBT Life.

For complete information, visit the Tam Institute for Jewish Studies.