Jennifer Finney Boylan (born June 22, 1958) is a bestselling author,

transgender A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through tr ...

activist, professor at

Barnard College Barnard College of Columbia University is a private women's liberal arts college in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a group of women led by young student activist Annie Nathan Meyer, who petitioned Columbia ...

, and a contributing opinion writer for the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

''.

Early life and education

Boylan was born in

Valley Forge, Pennsylvania The Village of Valley Forge is an unincorporated settlement located on the west side of Valley Forge National Historical Park at the confluence of Valley Creek and the Schuylkill River in Pennsylvania. The remaining village is in Schuylkill Tow ...

, and graduated from

The Haverford School , motto_translation = , address = 450 Lancaster Avenue , location = , region = , city = Haverford , county = , state = Pennsylvania , ...

, a private prep school in

Haverford, Pennsylvania Haverford is an unincorporated community located in both Haverford Township in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States, and Lower Merion Township in Montgomery County, approximately west of Philadelphia. The Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) open ...

, in 1976. She graduated from

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a Private university, private liberal arts college, liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a Men's colleges in the United States, men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Epis ...

in 1980, then completed graduate work in English at

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

Career

Boylan was on the faculty of

Colby College Colby College is a private liberal arts college in Waterville, Maine. It was founded in 1813 as the Maine Literary and Theological Institution, then renamed Waterville College after the city where it resides. The donations of Christian philant ...

from 1988 to 2014. In 2000, she was named "Professor of the Year" at Colby College. She moved to Barnard in 2014, where she is both Professor of English and

Anna Quindlen Anna Marie Quindlen (born July 8, 1952) is an American author, journalist, and opinion columnist. Her ''The New York Times, New York Times'' column, Public and Private, won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 1992 Pulitzer Prize, 1992. She bega ...

Writer-in-Residence. Boylan has written thirteen books, including novels, collections of short stories, and her memoir. Her 2003 memoir, ''She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders'' was the first book published by an openly

American to become a bestseller and was described by ''The Advocate'' as "a seminal piece of the trans literary canon". Her memoir, ''Good Boy: My Life in Seven Dogs'' was published on April 21, 2020 with Celadon Books. In October 2022, she published ''Mad Honey'', a novel co-written with New York Times bestselling author,

Jodi Picoult Jodi Lynn Picoult () is an American writer. Picoult has published 28 novels, accompanying short stories, and has also written several issues of Wonder Woman. Approximately 40 million copies of her books are in print worldwide, translated into 34 ...

. She was a Contributing Opinion Writer in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' from October 2007 to April 2022. In 2013, Boylan was chosen as the first openly transgender co-chair of

GLAAD GLAAD (), an acronym of Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, is an American non-governmental media monitoring organization originally founded as a protest against defamatory coverage of gay and lesbian demographics and their portrayals ...

's National Board of Directors. Boylan also serves on the Policy Advisory Board of

Gender Rights Maryland Gender Rights Maryland is an American civil rights and advocacy organization serving Maryland's transgender community. Gender Rights Maryland's mission is to "aid in the advancement, achievement and protection of the civil rights of transpeople th ...

and the Board of Trustees of the Kinsey Institute for Research on Sex, Gender, and Reproduction.

Public life

Boylan has spoken on numerous college campuses, including Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, and Barnard. Boylan has made appearances via a variety of media outlets to discuss her life, books, and activism. She has appeared on ''

The Oprah Winfrey Show ''The Oprah Winfrey Show'', often referred to as ''The Oprah Show'' or simply ''Oprah'', is an American daytime broadcast syndication, syndicated talk show that aired nationally for 25 seasons from September 8, 1986, to May 25, 2011, in Chicag ...

'', ''

Larry King Live ''Larry King Live'' was an American television talk show hosted by Larry King on CNN from 1985 to 2010. It was the channel's most watched and longest-running program, with over one million viewers nightly. Mainly aired from CNN's Los Angeles ...

'', ''

The Today Show ''Today'' (also called ''The Today Show'' or informally, ''NBC News Today'') is an American news and talk morning television show that airs weekdays from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. on NBC. The program debuted on January 14, 1952. It was ...

'', '' 48 Hours'', and

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

. She made an appearance on ''

20/20 Visual acuity (VA) commonly refers to the clarity of vision, but technically rates an examinee's ability to recognize small details with precision. Visual acuity is dependent on optical and neural factors, i.e. (1) the sharpness of the retinal ...

'' on April 24, 2015 after Caitlyn Jenner came out as trans, and regularly appeared on screen and as a consultant on Jenner's reality show ''

I Am Cait ''I Am Cait'' is an American television documentary series which chronicles the life of Caitlyn Jenner after her gender transition. The eight-part one-hour documentary series debuted on July 26, 2015, on the E! network. The series focuses on th ...

''. Based on the text of the appeal, she signed "

A Letter on Justice and Open Debate "A Letter on Justice and Open Debate", also known as the ''Harper's'' Letter, is an open letter defending free speech published on the ''Harper's Magazine'' website on July 7, 2020, with 153 signatories, criticizing what it called "illiberalism" ...

" which appeared on ''

Harper's Magazine ''Harper's Magazine'' is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance, and the arts. Launched in New York City in June 1850, it is the oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the U.S. (''Scientific American'' is older, b ...

'' website on 7 July 2020, including many high-profile names, some with controversial positions on human sexuality within the trans community, such as

J. K. Rowling Joanne Rowling ( "rolling"; born 31 July 1965), also known by her pen name J. K. Rowling, is a British author and Philanthropy, philanthropist. She wrote ''Harry Potter'', a seven-volume children's fantasy series published from 1997 to ...

. On discovering the names of the other signatories post-publication, Boylan retracted her signature. On

's news quiz program " Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me!", Boylan achieved a perfect score when tested about

hot dogs A hot dog (uncommonly spelled hotdog) is a food consisting of a grilled or steamed sausage served in the slit of a partially sliced Hot dog bun, bun. The term hot dog can refer to the sausage itself. The sausage used is a wiener (Vienna sausag ...

Personal life

Boylan is a

trans woman A trans woman or a transgender woman is a woman who was assigned male at birth. Trans women have a female gender identity, may experience gender dysphoria, and may transition; this process commonly includes hormone replacement therapy and so ...

. She has two children, Zaira and Sean, with Deirdre Boylan, whom she married in 1988. Boylan began transitioning in 2000. In 2019, she told the

LGBTQ&A ''LGBTQ&A'' is a podcast hosted by Jeffrey Masters and produced by '' The Advocate'' magazine in partnership with GLAAD. It features interviews with notable LGBTQ figures such as Pete Buttigieg, Laverne Cox, Janelle Monáe, Brandi Carlile, and R ...

podcast A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing ...

, "I've been maybe three or four different women at this point in my life. Early on in transition, I was very youthful. I cared a lot about my appearance and being sexy and my clothes. Fashion was really important to me, passing was really important to me. Appearing cis, I'm sorry to say, was probably more important to me than it should have been...It's the spectacular mystery of life, the way we keep becoming other versions of ourselves." She lives with her wife in New York City and

Belgrade Lakes, Maine Belgrade is a New England town, town in Kennebec County, Maine, United States. Its population was 3,250 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. However, its population approximately doubles during the summer months as part-year residents re ...

. Nine years after she began her transition, Boylan published an article for ''The New York Times'' stating that "my spouse and I love each other, and that our legal union has been a good thing – for us, for our children and our community". Boylan plays keyboard instruments as well as the

zither Zithers (; , from the Greek word ''cithara'') are a class of stringed instruments. Historically, the name has been applied to any instrument of the psaltery family, or to an instrument consisting of many strings stretched across a thin, flat ...

and describes playing in various bands in her autobiography.

Awards and honors

In June 2020, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the first LGBTQ

Pride parade A pride parade (also known as pride march, pride event, or pride festival) is an outdoor event celebrating lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer culture, queer (LGBTQ) social and self-acceptance, achievements, LGBT rights by country o ...

, ''

Queerty ''Queerty'' is an online magazine and newspaper covering gay-oriented lifestyle and news, founded in 2005 by David Hauslaib. As of June 2015, the site had more than five million monthly unique visitors. History ''Queerty'' was founded by David ...

'' named her among the fifty heroes “leading the nation toward equality, acceptance, and dignity for all people”.

Bibliography

*''Remind Me to Murder You Later'' (1988) *''The Planets'' (April 15, 1991) *''The Constellations: A Novel'' (November 8, 1994) *''Getting In'' (September 1, 1998) *''She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders'' (July 29, 2003) *''I'm Looking Through You: Growing Up Haunted: A Memoir'' (January 15, 2008) *''Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror'' (May 11, 2010) *''Falcon Quinn and the Crimson Vapor'' (May 10, 2011) *''Stuck in the Middle with You: A Memoir of Parenting in Three Genders'' (April 30, 2013) *''Trans Bodies, Trans Selves: A Resource for the Transgender Community'' (June 10, 2014) *''You Are You'' (May 12, 2015) *''Falcon Quinn and the Bullies of Greenblud'' (September 16, 2016) *''Long Black Veil'' (April 11, 2017) *''Good Boy: My Life in Seven Dogs'' (April 21, 2020)

Anthologies

*''Sexual Metamorphosis: An Anthology of Transsexual Memoirs'' (April 12, 2005) *''The Book of Dads: Essays on the Joys, Perils, and Humiliations of Fatherhood'' (May 12, 2009) *''Love Is a Four-Letter Word: True Stories of Breakups, Bad Relationships, and Broken Hearts'' (July 28, 2009) *''How Beautiful the Ordinary'' (October 6, 2009) *''It Gets Better'' (March 22, 2011) *''Truth & Dare: 20 Tales of Heartbreak and Happiness'' (April 26, 2011)

References

External links

*
Barnard College faculty profile

Jennifer Finney Boylan Papers, 1961-2004
MC 1025; T-550. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. {{DEFAULTSORT:Boylan, Jennifer Finney 1958 births American autobiographers American memoirists American women academics American women memoirists Barnard College faculty Colby College faculty Haverford School alumni Johns Hopkins University alumni LGBT memoirists LGBT people from Maine LGBT people from Pennsylvania Lambda Literary Award winners Living people Participants in American reality television series People from Belgrade, Maine People from Chester County, Pennsylvania Transgender academics LGBT media personalities Transgender women Transgender writers Transgender rights activists Transgender studies academics Wesleyan University alumni Writers from Maine