Contact Information
Research Areas
Research Interests
Autism and human rights in the contemporary United States; medieval European history
Research Description
What Today Withholds: Autism and Human Rights in America (2023) makes use of extensive research and, much more importantly, the voices of autistic people themselves to examine the hostility, discrimination, violence and humiliation autistic people face in today's America. The root of this problem is American society's continuing refusal to view autistics as fully human. It is important to remember, though, that--being fully human--autistic citizens are organizing to fight back against the myths and the abuse.
Please note that since the book was published the situation has become sharply worse, with the shadow of eugenics falling over the autistic community.
Education
Ph.D., Stanford University, 1985
Additional Campus Affiliations
Emerita Professor - Gender and Women's Studies
Emerita - Medieval Studies
Recent Publications
BOOKS
McLaughlin, Megan. What Today Withholds: Autism and Human Rights in America. Published privately, 2023.
McLaughlin, Megan. Sex, Gender and Episcopal Authority in an Age of Reform, 1000-1122. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
McLaughlin, Megan. Consorting with Saints: Prayer for the Dead in Early Medieval France. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1994.
BOOK CONTRIBUTIONS
McLaughlin, Megan ""The Church as Bride in Eleventh-Century England"." Les Strategies matrimoniales (IXe-XIII siecles), Turnhout: Brepols, 2013.
""Women and Men"." The Cambridge History of Christianity, vol. 4: Christianity in Western Europe, c. 1100-c. 1500, compiled by Miri Rubin, compiled by Walter Simons. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2009, p. 187-99.
""The Bishop as Bridegroom: Marital Imagery and Clerical Celibacy in the Eleventh and Early Twelfth Centuries"." Medieval Purity and Piety: Essays on Medieval Clerical Celibacy and Religious Reform, edited by Michael Frassetto. New York: Garland, 1998, p. 209-37.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""Spiritual and Secular Fatherhood in the Eleventh Century"." Conflicted Identities and Multiple Masculinities: Men in the Medieval West, edited by Jacqueline Murray. New York: Garland, 1999, p. 25-43.
JOURNAL ARTICLES
McLaughlin, Megan. ""Disgusting Acts of Shamelessness: Sexual Misconduct and the Deconstruction of Royal Authority in the Eleventh Century"." Early Medieval Europe, vol. forthcoming, 2011.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""The Bishop in the Bedroom: Witnessing Episcopal Sexuality in an Age of Reform"." Journal of the History of Sexuality, vo. 19, no. 1, 2010, p. 17-34.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""Abominable Mingling: Father-Daughter Incest and the Law"." Medieval Feminist Newsletter, vol. 24, 1997, p. 26-30.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""The Twelfth-Century Ritual of Death and Burial at Saint-Jean-en-Vallee in the Diocese of Chartres"." Revue Benedictine, vol. 105, 1995, p. 155-66.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""'Familiarity and Love': Noble Friendship and Liturgical Commemoration in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries."." Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Western Society for French History, vol. 18, 1991, p. 60-69.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""Gender Paradox and the Otherness of God"." Gender & History, vol. 3, 1991, p. 147-59.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""On Communion with the Dead"." Journal of Medieval History, vol. 17, 1991, p. 23-34.
McLaughlin, Megan. ""The Woman Warrior: Gender, Warfare and Society in Medieval Europe"." Women's Studies, vol. 17, 1990, p. 193-209.