Alice Ruth Wexler (born May 31, 1942) is an American author and historian. She has written two biographies on the anarchist

Emma Goldman Emma Goldman (June 27, 1869 – May 14, 1940) was a Russian-born Anarchism, anarchist revolutionary, political activist, and writer. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europ ...

. Wexler has also written about

Huntington's disease Huntington's disease (HD), also known as Huntington's chorea, is an incurable neurodegenerative disease that is mostly Genetic disorder#Autosomal dominant, inherited. It typically presents as a triad of progressive psychiatric, cognitive, and ...

, which has affected her family and which her younger sister,

Nancy Wexler Nancy Wexler (born 19 July 1945) FRCP MEASA is an American geneticist and the Higgins Professor of Neuropsychology in the Departments of Neurology and Psychiatry of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons The Columbia Uni ...

, researches.

Early life and career

Alice Ruth Wexler was born May 31, 1942, in

New York, New York New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on New York Harbor, one of the world's largest natural harb ...

, to Leonore (Sabin) and Milton. Though her parents divorced in 1962, her mother's diagnosis of

late in the 1960s became a central research focus of the family. Wexler taught at

Sonoma State University Sonoma State University (SSU, Sonoma State, or Sonoma) is a public university in Sonoma County, California, United States. It is part of the California State University system. Sonoma State offers 92 bachelor's degree programs, 19 master's de ...

from 1972 to 1982. She served as a visiting professor of history at multiple American universities and received a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...

in 1999.

Works

* '' Emma Goldman: An Intimate Life'' (1984) * '' Emma Goldman in Exile'' (1989) * ''Mapping Fate: A Memoir of Family, Risk, and Genetic Research'' (1995) * ''The Woman Who Walked into the Sea: Huntington's and the Making of a Genetic Disease'' (2008)

References

1942 births American historians Living people {{US-bio-writer-stub