Current Appointment
Visiting Scholar of Gender Studies, Affiliate of the Reilly Center for Science, Technology & Values
Education
PhD Gender Studies Indiana University, IN
MA Gender Studies Indiana University, IN
BA Biology, Women’s & Gender Studies College of Charleston, SC
Past Appointments
Postdoctoral Fellow of Gender Studies, University of Notre Dame (2019-2021)
Associate Instructor, Indiana University (2013-2019)
Competitive Awards and Fellowships
• Institute for Citizens and Scholars (formerly the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation) Dissertation Fellowship in Women’s Studies
• College of Arts and Sciences Dissertation Research Fellowship, Indiana University
• Reynolds-Finley Associates Fellowship in the History of Health Sciences, Lister Hill Libraries Historical Collections Unit, University of Alabama at Birmingham
• Graduate Scholars Fellowship, Indiana University
Refereed Publications
• Schnabel, L, Breitwieser, L, & Hawbaker, A. (2016). Subjectivity in Feminist Science and Technology Studies: Implications and Applications for Sociological Research. Sociology Compass, 10 (4), 318-329.
• Schnabel, L & Breitwieser, L. (2015). Recent Advances in Feminist Science and Technology Studies: Reconceptualizing Subjectivity and Knowledge. Advances in Gender Research, 20, 43-63.
Articles in Progress
• Breitwieser, L & Scott, J. (Revise & Resubmit). Femininity, Body Size, and (Mis)Fitting in
Rock Climbing Culture. For Fat Studies, special issue on Fat Femininities.
• Breitwieser, L. (In Preparation) Brain-Dead and Pregnant: Reproductive Technologies of
Life and Death. For Technology and Culture special issue on Childbirth Technologies &
Techniques.
Invited Talks
• “Affirming Rights for Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual People,” a lecture on the science of human sexuality and the Russian constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, Институт Региональной Прессы [The Regional Press Institute], Jun. 2020, online
• “Postmortem Pregnancy and Gender Politics in the ICU,” a lecture on the social and political significance of maternal brain death during pregnancy, Tuscaloosa, AL, Feb. 2019
• “Freak Shows and the Politics of Staring,” a lecture on the continued cultural significance of 19th-century freak shows for medicine and the intersection of gender, race and disability, Plattsburg, NY, Dec. 2018
Campus Talks
• “A Crip History of Brain Death,” a retelling of brain death history through a disability lens,
University of Notre Dame, IN, Apr. 2020
• “Gray Matters: Postmortem Pregnancy at the Nexus of Brain Death Law and Science,” a
lecture on Roe v. Wade, women’s autonomy, and advance directives, University of
Notre Dame, IN, Sep. 2019
• “Dead Mothers, Live Births,” a presentation of original postmortem pregnancy research
findings and their implication for understanding necropolitics in intensive care units,
Indiana University, IN, Feb. 2019
Recent Conference Presentations
2021 Epistemic Difference Is Not Medical Malpractice: Brain Death and Pregnancy in
Japan and the United States, National Women’s Studies Association Conference
(NWSA), Minneapolis, MN, Nov. 12-15
2019 Capillary Action and Corporeal Geographies of Animacy, NWSA Conference, San
Francisco, CA, Nov. 14–17 (panel organizer)
2019 Dead Mothers, Live Births, Annual Meeting of the Society for the Social Studies of
Science, New Orleans, LA, Sep. 4-7
2019 Biomedical Logics of Life and Death and Their Gendered Implications, Gender,
Bodies & Technology Conference, Roanoke, VA, Apr. 25-27
2018 Suspending Animation: Gendering Time of Death through Reproductive
Technology, NWSA Conference, Atlanta, GA, Nov. 8-11
2018 Suspending Animation: The Necropolitics of Postmortem Pregnancy, Central
States Anthropological Society Conference, Bloomington, IN, Apr. 19-21
2017 Not Dead Yet but Not Quite Alive: Postmortem Pregnancies and the Indeterminacy
of Life and Death, NWSA Conference, Baltimore, MD, Nov. 16-19
2017 Would You Say You “Had Sex” If…? A Comparison of Age-Matched Samples of Self-
Identified Heterosexual, Bisexual, and Homosexual Women and Men, International
Academy of Sex Research, Charleston, SC, Jul. 23-26
2017 Teaching Introduction to WGS: A Workshop Sharing Innovations in the Classroom
Roundtable, Southeastern Women’s Studies Association Conference (SEWSA),
Atlanta, GA, Mar. 23-25
2016 Pedagogical Imagination and the Classroom as a Speculative Location Roundtable,
NWSA Conference, Montréal, Québec, Canada, Nov. 10-13
2016 Necro-Crip Affinities and the Death of Intersectionality, SEWSA Conference, Rock
Hill, SC, Mar. 31-Apr. 2
Research and Working Group Memberships
• Organizer, Postdoctoral Fellows in the Humanities and Social Sciences Writing Workshop,
University of Notre Dame, 2019-present
• Race, Science, and Nature Research Group, University Notre Dame, 2020-present
• Science Education Research Group, University of Notre Dame, 2020-present
Co-Organizer, Disability Studies in the Humanities Research Group, Indiana University,
2013-2019
• Science and Technology Studies Research Workshop, Indiana University, 2013-2019
Additional Professional Experience
Undergraduate Advisor, University Division of the Office of the Vice Provost for
Undergraduate Education, Indiana University (su2018)
Research Assistant, IU Department of Gender Studies (2014-2015, sp2016)
Courses Taught
University of Notre Dame,Notre Dame, IN
Foundations in Gender Studies (graduate seminar)
Contemporary Concerns in Medicine
The Human and Its Others (pro-seminar)
Mad in America: Gender, Mental Health, and Popular Culture
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
Gender, Culture, and Society (introductory course)
Explaining Sex/Gender Differences (discussion sections)
Gender, Death, & Western Medicine
Feminist Pedagogy and Praxis (independent study)
Cultural Politics of Body Modification
Gender, Madness, & Popular Culture
Gender, Madness, & Society (independent study)
Student Advising
Anna R., Undergraduate Research Assistantship, 2020-2021
Juliana Z., University of Notre Dame Senior Thesis (Liberal Studies), “Apiarian Personhood:
Aristotelian Rationality, Bees, and the Human,” 2021
James Z., University of Notre Dame Senior Thesis (Gender Studies), “The Anticipatory Body:
Toward a Critical Trans Materialisms,” 2020
Juwang L., University of Notre Dame Senior Research Project (Science, Technology, and
Values), “Cultural Barriers Against Health Care Utilization for Korean Americans,” 2020
Kal L., Indiana University Honors Thesis (Political Science), “Marriage and American
Citizenship: An Analysis of Same-Sex Marriage Bans,” 2017
Lectures, Symposia, and Workshops Organized
• Histories of Anti-Asian Violence in the US: Politics, Gender, and Resistance, University of
Notre Dame (UND), Apr. 29, 2021
• Processing Anti-Asian Violence: A Roundtable Discussion on the Atlanta Shootings, UND,
Apr. 8, 2021
• Gender Studies Book Club, UND [multiple events, sp2021]
• Anne Fausto-Sterling Distinguished Lecturer Visit, UND, Feb. 25 & 26, 2021
• Co-Organizer, Academic Careers in the Medical Humanities Workshop, Nov 10, 2020
• Gender Studies Graduate Career Workshop, May 1, 2020
• Hil Malatino Distinguished Lecturer Visit, Educating the Whole Physician Series, UND, Mar.
4, 2020
• Moderator and Organizer, Affirming Care for Gender Diverse Youth Panel Discussion, UND,
Feb. 4, 2020
• “Disability and Accessibility in the Classroom” Associate Instructor Workshop on
Classroom Climate, Indiana University (IU) Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning
(CITL), Aug. 15 & 17, 2017 and Aug. 14 & 16, 2018
• Gender Studies Research Colloquium Series, IU, 2015-2017 [multiple events]
• Volunteer Coordinator, New View Campaign Capstone Conference, Oct. 6-8, 2016
• “You as the Subject of Your Teaching” Associate Instructor Workshop on Classroom
Climate, IU CITL, Aug. 16 & 18, 2016
• Regulating Intimacy Graduate Symposium, IU, Oct. 17-19 2014
• Graphic Design, Women’s and Gender Studies Undergraduate Conference, IU, Apr. 11-12,
2013