Carrie N. Baker, J.D., Ph.D.

Carrie N. Baker, J.D., Ph.D., is the Sylvia Dlugasch Bauman Professor of American Studies and Chair of the Program for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. She is a regular writer and contributing editor at Ms. magazine and has a radio show, Feminist Futures, on WHMP 101.5 in Northampton, Massachusetts. She is an expert on women's rights law and policy, specializing in sexual harassment, sex trafficking, and reproductive rights and justice.

Baker has a bachelor of arts degree in philosophy from Yale University, a juris doctor degree from Emory University School of Law, and master of arts and doctor of philosophy degrees from Emory's Institute of Women's Studies. She was editor-in-chief of the Emory Law Journal while in law school and later served as a law clerk to United States District Court Judge Marvin H. Shoob in Atlanta.

Baker was a co-founder and former co-director of the Five College Certificate in Reproductive Health, Rights and Justice. Baker is affiliated with programs in journalism, archives and public policy at Smith College.

Baker's primary areas of research are women's legal history, gender and public policy, and feminist activism. Her first book, The Women's Movement Against Sexual Harassment (Cambridge University Press, 2008), won the National Women's Studies Association 2008 Sara A. Whaley book prize. This book examines how a diverse grassroots social movement created public policy on sexual harassment in the 1970s and 1980s. Baker’s second book, Fighting the US Youth Sex Trade: Gender, Race and Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2018), tells the story of activism against youth involvement in the sex trade in the United States between 1970 and 2015. Baker also co-authored a law school textbook on sexual harassment law with Jennifer Drobac and Rigel Oliveri and co-edited an open access anthology, Public Feminisms: From Academy to Community (Lever Press, 2022) about how scholars are engaging the public. Her most recent book is Abortion Pills: US History and Politics (Amherst College Press, 2024), available open access.

Sub-specialties: Sexual harassment (law, policy, activism, history), Sex trafficking (law, policy, activism, history, US youth sex trade), Reproductive rights (pregnancy discrimination, abortion law, abortion pills, contraception policy), Women's rights in the US (history and contemporary), Feminism and intersectionality (women's movements historically and today), Equal Rights Amendment, Women's Studies (history of field, pedagogy).