Kansas State University

MANHATTAN -- Social historian and author Stephanie Coontz will present two lectures for Kansas State University groups in May. Her visit is being sponsored by the department of women studies.

A professor of history and family studies at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash., Coontz also is director of research and public education for the Council on Contemporary Families. She is the author of several books, a frequent contributor to the New York Times and was quoted recently in the Wall Street Journal. She also appeared in the PBS special on the women's movement, "Makers!"

Coontz will give the fourth annual Women's Studies Advisory Board lecture, "Mad Men, Working Girls and Desperate Housewives: How far have men and women come from the 1960s?" on Thursday, May 2, at the Holiday Inn at the Campus, 17th Street and Anderson Avenue. The event begins with a social hour and book signing at 6 p.m., followed by dinner and the lecture. Tickets are required and cost $45 for the general public and $35 for students. For tickets, call Kim Garver at 785-532-5738 by April 29.

For her second presentation, Coontz will deliver the lecture "Courting Trouble? The World-Historical Transformation of Love and Marriage" at 10:30 a.m. Friday, May 3, in Forum Hall at the K-State Student Union. The lecture, which is free and open to the public, is co-sponsored by the departments of women's studies, English and history; the offices of the president and the provost; the colleges of Business Administration and Human Ecology; the School of Leadership Studies; Phi Beta Kappa; and the University Honors Program.

Varney's will sell copies of Coontz's books at both events. She is the author of "A Strange Stirring": The Feminine Mystique and American Women at the Dawn of the 1960s," published in 2011; and the award-winning "Marriage, A History: How Love Conquered Marriage," published in 2005. She also wrote "The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap," "The Way We Really Are: Coming to Terms with America's Changing Families" and "The Social Origins of Private Life: A History of American Families." In addition, she edited "American Families: A Multicultural Reader," released by Routledge in 2008. Her work has been translated into French, Arabic, Spanish, Russian, Czech, German, Norwegian, Turkish, Greek, Chinese, Ukrainian and Japanese.

Coontz has testified about her research before the House Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families in Washington, D.C., and addressed audiences across America, Japan and Europe. She has been a featured speaker at the Renaissance Weekend, PopTech and Chautauqua, and she has appeared on "The Colbert Report," "Today Show," "PBS News Hour with Ray Suarez," "Oprah," "Crossfire," "20/20," NPR, CNN's "Talk Back Live," "CBS This Morning," CSPAN, the "O'Reilly Factor" and MSNBC with Brian Williams. She also has been in several prime-time television documentaries, including ones hosted by Walter Cronkite and Barbara Walters.

Coontz has published articles in the New York Times, the Observer/Guardian, The Times of London, Wall Street Journal, Salon, Washington Post, Newsweek, Harper's, Vogue, LIFE, Time-LIFE Books and Mirabella, as well as in such professional journals as Annals, Family Therapy Magazine, Chronicle of Higher Education, National Forum and Journal of Marriage and Family. She also has contributed chapters to more than 25 academic books.

A former Woodrow Wilson fellow, Coontz has also taught at Kobe University in Japan and the University of Hawaii at Hilo. In 2004, she received the Council on Contemporary Families first-ever Visionary Leadership Award. In 1995 she accepted the Dale Richmond Award from the American Academy of Pediatrics for outstanding contributions to the field of child development. She also received the 2001-2002 Friend of the Family award from the Illinois Council on Family Relations. Coontz served as a marriage consultant to The Ladies Home Journal from 2006-2009 and consulted with the Pew Research Center in developing its questionnaire for a 2010 report on the state of marriage and family life in America, as well as with Match.com for its 2011 survey on singles.

More information about Coontz and links to her recent articles are available at her website, http://www.stephaniecoontz.com.