Lena Chen

is a reluctant sexpert, a feminist and queer advocate, and a walking case study on bad publicity. As a Harvard undergrad, she authored the blog Sex and the Ivy about her college sexcapades and misadventures. Her reputation has never quite recovered. Want to give her a book deal, send her hate mail, or misquote her in an article? Read her daily musings at The Ch!cktionary and check out her full bio.

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Live On Campus & On Camera

As a speaker on gender and sexuality, Lena Chen has given workshops and presentations to small and large student audiences on campuses throughout the country. She has also worked an event organizer, leading projects such as the 2010 Rethinking Virginity conference at Harvard as well as the Feminist Portrait Project/Feminist Coming Out Day, a national campaign. Her talks are engaging, unpretentious, and never entirely appropriate for polite company. Lena has spoken about the following topics:

  • casual sex and the college hook-up culture
  • the history of virginity and the American abstinence movement
  • slut-shaming and sexual double standards
  • the role of social media in progressive activism and the new media future of feminism
  • careers in sex-positive writing and social justice

On camera, she hosts the webcast “Sex Really With Lena Chen” for the National Campaign To Prevent Teen & Unplanned Pregnancy and regularly talked to readers via video as head blogger for gURL.com’s Health, Sex, & Relationships blog. Lena has also chatted on- and off-camera about sexual health with everyone from Dr. Drew to Dr. Ruth, with whom she once co-hosted an abstinence-themed episode of mtvU’s “Sex Cred with Dr. Ruth”.

Want to bring her to your campus or event? Get in touch via the Contact page. (Lena has a soft spot for feminist and LGBT student groups.)

Her previous speaking engagements have included:

2012

Yale University, Sex Week At Yale, Writing Sex: A Panel On Sex Positive Writing (New Haven, CT)

Ustream, XOXOSMS Internet Premiere (Virtual) *

SXSW, Interactive, Sex in the Digital Age (Austin, TX) *

Sex::Tech Conference, Authentic Relationships and Online Identities Panel & XOXOSMS Screening (San Francisco, CA) *

* Upcoming

2011

Stanford University, “Am I A Virgin If …?”: Deconstructing The Myth Of Sexual Purity, (Palo Alto, CA)

Women’s Media Center, An Evening With Gloria Steinem & Young Feminist Leaders, (Herbst Theater - San Francisco, CA)

Brown University, Sex Week At Brown, “Am I A Virgin If …?”: Deconstructing The Myth Of Sexual Purity, (Providence, RI)

Harvard University, Activism & The Feminist Blogosphere (Cambridge, MA)

Rutgers University, Sex, Love, & Dating Conference, Hooking Up & Getting Down: The State Of Casual Sex & The College Romance (New Brunswick, NJ)

Yale University, Yale In New York: A Conversation With Lena Chen (Antibes Bistro - New York, NY)

Ain’t I A Woman: Race In The Feminist Movement (Galapagos Art Space - Brooklyn, NY)

Yale University, Feminism 3.0: The New Frontier Of Media Activism (New Haven, CT)

2010

Cornell University, Sex Columnists Bare All (Ithaca, NY)

More Magazine, Naomi Wolf Talks With Feminism’s New Leaders (92Y Tribeca - New York, NY)

Harvard University, Undergraduate Gender Research Conference, The Social Transformation of Sexual Norms In America, Senior Thesis Presentation,(Cambridge, MA)

Harvard University, Rethinking Virginity Conference, Toward A Sex-Positive Vision Of Abstinence (Cambridge, MA)

2009

Harvard University, Asian American Awareness Week, Interracial Dating Panel (Cambridge, MA)

Harvard University, Asian American Awareness Week, Female Sexuality Panel (Cambridge, MA)

Western Washington University, Is Sex Positive Feminism Still Relevant? (Bellingham, WA)

2008

Harvard University, Asian American Women In Leadership Conference (Cambridge, MA)

Harvard University, Lena Chen vs. True Love Revolution (Cambridge, MA)