The Right to Be Parents LGBT Families and the Transformation of Parenthood [Hardcover]

The Right to be
Parents is the first book to provide a detailed history of how LGBT parents
have turned to the courts to protect and defend their relationships with their
children. Carlos A. Ball chronicles the stories of LGBT parents who, in seeking
to gain legal recognition of and protection for their relationships with their
children, have fundamentally changed how American law defines and regulates
parenthood. To this day, some courts are still not able to look beyond sexual
orientation and gender identity in cases involving LGBT parents and their
children. Yet on the whole, Ball’s stories are of progress and transformation:
as a result of these pioneering LGBT parent litigants, the law is increasingly
recognizing the wide diversity in American familial structures.

This book sheds light on the dark underbelly of hidden American history. I imagine that this book would be an amazing read for LGBT families. As a straight American, I learned a lot and have a whole new appreciation for the struggle of gay rights. Unique and essential, Professor Balls book recounts compelling tales of lesbian and gay parents fighting in the courts for rights that most Americans take for granted. The narratives make little-known histories available even to readers with no legal training, and they also provide clear explanations of legal issues that have been at stake. A wonderful contribution, this volume should be of special interest to lesbian and gay parents and their children as well as to all those who care about them. Ball's The Right to be Parents is the first book to examine how . . . LGBT parents have turned to the courts for protection of their relationships with their children . . . a clearly written, sympathetic, scholarly account of these developments. Recommended [for] all readership levels. The cases discussed in the book are not only of interest to gay-rights advocates. As Ball says so powerfully, 'Legal disputes involving Llc$