About Mairead
MSW, PhD and Associate Professor and Department Chair, Loyola Marymount University
I am an associate professor of women’s and gender studies at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, CA and author of the award-winning and Lammy nominated book Lesbian Death: Desire and Danger Between Feminist and Queer (Minnesota, 2022), in addition to a number of peer-reviewed articles. Prior to pursuing a PhD at Emory University, where I was a project manager in the Emory Center for Digital Studies, I worked for several years in LGBT and feminist public health.
About Mairead’s project
Acyclovir, Citizen Science, and the Reach of HIV/AIDS Activism
My project consists of archival research for my current book project, Herpes: A Cultural Biography, which explores the cultural history of herpes simplex virus (HSV) from the early 1980s to the present. This project uses the herpes virus as a case study for elucidating changes to our understanding of sexual health in the post-AIDS climate and the effects of these changes on the lives of sexually and racially marginalized individuals and communities. For my work at UCSF, I will focus on understanding the stakeholders and affective rhetoric generated in the development and dissemination of the drug acyclovir, the first antiviral drug ever patented and the primary treatment for HSV. My primary data sources include the No More Silence dataset, the American Sexual Health Association newsletter, The Helper, and transcripts from the FDA’s 1994 hearing on over-the-counter herpes medication. This research will support a central chapter of my book and potentially lead to a publicly available digital resource to orient people affected by herpes to its history of stigma and stigmatization.