Background
Robinson, Lillian Sara was born on April 18, 1941 in New York City. Daughter of Isak Leon and Fannie Robinson.
Robinson, Lillian Sara was born on April 18, 1941 in New York City. Daughter of Isak Leon and Fannie Robinson.
Degree at Brown University in 1962, and a Doctor of Philosophy from Columbia University. She insisted that "gender could not usefully be studied except in relationship to race and class".
She was the principal of the Simone de Beauvoir Institute and professor of Women"s studies at Concordia University at the time of her death. She is described as "revolutionary, Marxist, and feminist..an activist student". She earned a Bachelor of Arts/Master of Arts Her dissertation was published in 1985.
Throughout her life, Robinson was actively involved in various civil and human rights struggles.
She marched against the United States war in Vietnam, racism, and, shortly before her death, also worked with the Jewish Alliance Against the Occupation branch in Montreal. Her work in women"s studies was groundbreaking for its time.
Her views on this matter are expounded upon in her work A particularly noteworthy article in this book on the importance of examining race and class is "Who"s Afraid of a Room of One"s Own?" in which she discusses developments in the realm of sexuality and politics as it pertains to women since Virginia Woolf"s time. She argues that class plays a much greater role in determining what kind of place and identity a woman has in society, which was not thoroughly examined in Woolf"s work A Room of One"s Own.
She also argues that the sexual freedom that women have gained since the sexual revolution has come at a cost, that in fact "permission to be unchaste has not freed women from the object-role we occupied when it was chastity that was the valued commodity".
Professor Robinson was Poet in Residence at Albright College in Reading Pennsylvania during the 1984-1985 academic year. Lillian Robinson died of ovarian cancer in Montreal, Canada on September 20, 2006.
Member American Studies Association, Modern Language Association.
Married Martin Lopez-Morillas, January 29, 1963 (divorced November 1965). Married David Ethan Gilden, October 5, 1970 (divorced June 1991). 1 child, Isak Ethan (Alex).