New research on same-sex marriage in US

On April 28, the US Supreme Court will hear arguments in a landmark case on marriage equality and the constitutionality of state bans on same-sex marriage. New research by University of Victoria historian Dr. Rachel Hope Cleves reveals insights on 500 years of same-sex unions in the US and refutes the claim that such unions are newer than cell phones or other modern technology.

Cleves believes there is a “huge history still to be told” which will handily refute the notion that partners of the same sex were neither recognized nor accepted as couples in the America of earlier centuries. “One missing piece in the ongoing mobilization of support for same-sex marriage in America was a scholarly historicization of same-sex unions,” says Cleves. While conducting research for her recent book, Charity and Sylvia: A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America, she assembled many examples of same-sex unions and published the new research ahead of next month’s US landmark ruling.

“‘What, Another Female Husband?’: The Prehistory of Same-Sex Marriage in America,” which appeared in the March 2015 edition of The Journal of American History, provides historical context for the cresting debate on civil rights and full equality of marriage in the US, where same-sex marriage is already legal in nearly 40 states. Cleves is an associate professor in UVic’s history department and an expert on the history of sexuality in North America, particularly LGBT history and same-sex marriage from the colonial era to the present.

Read more on Cleves and this research.

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