Hugo Schwyzer is an author and speaker who has taught history and gender studies at Pasadena City College since 1993. In addition to courses on women’s history, men and masculinity, and gay and lesbian history, he developed the college’s first interdisciplinary course focusing on “Beauty and the Body” in the late 1990s, a class he continues to offer today and which focuses on the historical roots of contemporary eating disorders and distorted body image.
Born in Santa Barbara and raised on the Monterey Peninsula, Hugo received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley and holds a Ph.D. from UCLA.
Hugo has served as a facilitator, workshop leader, and speaker on issues revolving around sexuality, masculinity, and transforming self-image. He has presented workshops on body image, sexual harassment, overcoming perfectionism, and the “myth of male weakness” at institutions as diverse as Fuller Theological Seminary and Brown University. He is also a frequent guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and has appeared on CNN, the BBC, CTV, Current TV,the Young Turks and the Ricki Lake Show as an expert on body image, sexuality and gender justice. Hugo provided expert commentary for the National Geographic’s Taboo program during the 2012-13 season. He has been profiled in New York Magazine, The Atlantic, and Bitch.
A former weekly columnist at the Good Men Project and Jezebel, Hugo is now a regular contributor to Daily Life (Australia) and The Atlantic. Among other sites, his articles have appeared in the Guardian, the Los Angeles Times, Relevant, the Huffington Post, The Times of Israel, Alternet, Role/Reboot, Mamamia, XoJane, Modern Mom, Jewrotica, and The Frisky. His essays are featured in the anthologies Men Speak Out and Best Sex Writing 2012.
Hugo has previously served as consultant to the Network Talent Group and Natural Models LA, and continues to work with a wide variety of individuals and agencies in the modeling industry.
Hugo co-authored Beauty, Disrupted – the autobiography of famed supermodel Carré Otis, published in October 2011 by HarperCollins.
Since 2004, he has blogged at http://hugoschwyzer.net/
Hugo lives with his wife Eira and their two children, Heloise and David, in Los Angeles.