Dr. Sara Matthiesen

Areas of Expertise

Gender, sexuality, race, and reproduction in 20th century U.S. History 

Feminist theory 

U.S. social movements

Critical legal studies and legal history

Sara Matthiesen (she/her/hers) is an assistant professor of history and women's, gender, and sexuality studies at George Washington University. Professor Matthiesen's new book, Reproduction Reconceived: Family Making and the Limits of Choice after Roe v. Wade (University of California Press, 2021), traces how incarceration, disease, poverty, for-profit medical care and state neglect forced those living in the United States to work much harder to have and maintain family in the decades following the decriminalization of abortion in the U.S. She is currently at work on a second project that traces the persistence of self-managed and home abortion practices after Roe. Her academic work has been published in Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, Feminist Review, and Women’s Review of Books, and she has written for popular audiences in The Nation, The Chronicle of Higher Ed, and Jacobin.

Current Research

Matthiesen is currently completing a book on reproductive politics in the U.S. following the legalization of abortion. Reproduction Reconceived (forthcoming from UC Press) examines debates over women's right to engage in family-making during an era of newfound reproductive choice.

Classes Taught

"Fundamentals of Feminist Theory"

"Approaches to Women's and Gender History"

"U.S. Women's History II"