Associate Professor
early American, women, comparative cultural frontiers
Office: 2129 Taliaferro Hall
Department of History
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742
301-405-1156
301-314-9399fax
clyons@umd.edu
Education
Ph.D. Yale University, 1996. Degree granted with Distinction.
Publications
"Lyons has given us a book that has awaited its author for many decades--about sex and the city. The book . . . brims over with a brilliant fusion of social, cultural, and intellectual history, and builds a major thesis--the creation of 'the modern American sexual system'--on an indefatigable exploration of almanacs, poor relief records, court cases, and a host of other sources. . . . More than ever, readers will see how governing sexual relations is one of the most potent weapons of those who would control the city."--Gary B. Nash, University of California at Los Angeles
"Lyons's provocative study illuminates a surprising post-Revolutionary world of sexual license in which the old rules have broken down and new individualist behaviors have arisen in their place. But the heyday of the lusty woman . . . was to be short-lived, subdued by the reassertion of sexual order through a redefinition of normative female sexuality."--Kathleen M. Brown, University of Pennsylvania
"Historians have long believed that as the eighteenth century gave way to the nineteenth, the western world's ideas about sex changed dramatically. As to sexual behavior, however, we have remained largely in the dark. Using the records of the early republic's biggest city, Lyons charts the demise of a vibrant 'culture of pleasure'--in practice as well as in theory. . . . Required reading for anyone who wants to understand the foundations of modern sexuality."--Suzanne D. Lebsock, Rutgers University
Courses
HIST210/WMST210
HIST213 History of Sexuality in America
Current Research