Amber L. Hollibaugh

• Born — 20 June 1946 • Birthplace — Bakersfield, California, U.S. • Died — 20 October 2023 • Place of death — Brooklyn, New York, U.S. • Occupation — Writer, filmmaker and political activist • Notable Works — * The Heart of the Matter (1994) • Sexuality, Labor, and the New Trade Unionism (1999) • My Dangerous Desires: A Queer Girl Dreaming Her Way Home (2002)

Hollibaugh was born in Bakersfield, California. Her father was of Romani descent, while her mother was of Irish ancestry. Her father was dark-skinned and grew up traveling in caravans, and both he and her grandmother were harassed and branded by the Ku Klux Klan. Hollibaugh's working poor upbringing became central to her organizing work, helping her connect with people in rural and small towns and bringing an intersectional approach to her writings on gay rights and sexuality. Before full-time involvement in movement work, Hollibaugh hitchhiked across the country, did sex work, and organized with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and United Farm Workers.

After moving to Canada in the late 1960s, Hollibaugh was a leader in the Canadian movement for abortion rights. In 1978, Hollibaugh joined the group organizing against the Briggs Initiative in California, helping to overturn one of the first significant legislative attacks on LGBTQ civil rights. That same year, she was a co-founder, with Allan Bérubé and others, of the San Francisco Lesbian and Gay History Project. While based in San Francisco in the 1970s and 1980s, Hollibaugh was a contributor to the Socialist Review new-left movement journal. She also worked at Modern Times, a well-known movement bookstore and meeting-place. As discourse on sexuality in the feminist and lesbian-feminist movements picked up in the late 1970s, Hollibaugh was a significant voice in support of sexual liberation and sex work. Hollibaugh, alongside writer and organizer Cherríe Moraga, co-authored the piece "What We're Rollin' around in Bed With", a much-cited piece in the controversial "Sex Issue" of Heresies: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics. Hollibaugh was a speaker at the 1982 Barnard Conference on Sexuality, a key event in what became known as the feminist sex wars. Hollibaugh has written on the marginalization she experienced afterwards as a result of her being a former sex worker and involvement in the sadomasochism community.

Amber L. Hollibaugh died from complications of diabetes in Brooklyn, New York, on October 20, 2023, at the age of 77.

*

* * * * *

Hollibaugh was born on 20 June 1946 in Bakersfield. Hollibaugh held the nationality of United States.