The Gay Divorcee         

Jo Ann Citron's biography

Following my graduation from Vassar College, I earned a Ph.D. from Boston University and, later, a J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law. In between, I taught undergraduate courses in literature and writing at Boston University, Bates College, and M.I.T.

Though I'm licensed to practice law in New York as well as Massachusetts, I've confined my practice to the latter, where I've lived since graduate school. As an English professor, I specialized in British fiction and have written primarily about how family and domestic relationships are imagined in English novels. As an attorney, I've concentrated my practice in discrimination and other civil rights litigation, with an emphasis on police misconduct and municipal liability. I've also handled some family law matters, mostly pro bono. As a legal consultant for the Domestic Violence Institute at Northeastern University, I developed and implemented new ways of using electronic communities and information resources to improve the delivery of public interest legal services.

I have served on the board of the Women's Bar Association of Massachusetts and have been Treasurer and Vice President of its tax-exempt arm, the Women's Bar Foundation, which funds and administers an array of pro bono legal services for women and their children. I an currently Vice President of the board of the Massachusetts affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.

From 2000 to 2002, I was a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Research on Women at Wellesley College where I conducted research for my book whose working title is "The Gay Divorcee: How Same-Sex Couples Break Up." During the 2002-2003 academic year, I am a visiting Assistant Professor in the Women's Studies Department at Wellesley College where I teach a course entitled "The Changing Law, the New Family, and the State." For more information about me or the "The Gay Divorcee," you can read an interview I gave to the Provincetown Banner, email me at jacitron@comcast.net or write to me at:

Women's Studies Department
Wellesley College
106 Central Street
Wellesley, MA 02481-8203