Anna Lvovsky (Ph.D., History of American Civilization, Harvard University; J.D., Harvard Law School) is a legal scholar and historian of gender and sexuality whose work focuses on the intersection of state regulation, morality, and the social sciences. She is currently an Academic Fellow at Columbia Law School.
Her historical work examines the history of homosexuality in the United States, concentrating on state regulation and the proliferation of “expert” discourses on sexual deviance in the twentieth century. Her dissertation, Queer Expertise: Urban Policing and the Construction of Public Knowledge about Homosexuality, 1920-1970, explores how local police departments and vice squads functioned alongside scientific authorities and the popular media in shaping the lay public’s shifting perceptions of gay men.
Her legal scholarship focuses on the sociology of law, the institutional role of expertise in the courtroom, and the criminalization of intimate conduct. Her current projects explore the role of moral judgment in the Supreme Court’s theories of constitutional privacy, and the institutional function of scientific expertise in litigation concerning religious and sexual rights.