According to the American Heart Association, “Being an African American ‘superwoman’ might come with a price”.

The effects are from heart disease to mental health. Black women are more disportionately affected to improper medical treatment due to racism. Yet, it is black women that always stand up and save the world (i.e., 2020 presidential election).

The very women that displayed how the American construct works, are the same women that suffer due to their historical relationship in the American construct.

The sexual and reproductive health of African American women has been compromised due to multiple experiences of racism, including discriminatory healthcare practices from slavery through the post-Civil Rights era.

However, studies rarely consider how the historical underpinnings of racism negatively influence the present-day health outcomes of African American women.

For example, in 1961, Fannie Lou Townsend Hamer (1917-1977) received a hysterectomy by a white doctor without her consent while undergoing surgery to remove a uterine tumor. Such forced sterilisation of Black women, as a way to reduce the Black population, was so widespread it was dubbed a “Mississippi Appendectomy.”

Join us, as we draw from medical and academic professionals to discuss the body of the black female’s continued “mule” role.

Register to attend here

• Black Women, Research and Mental Health, Dr. Michelle Y. Williams, March 6, 2021
• Black Women and the COVID Vaccine, Dr. Christina Thorpe, March 13, 2021
• Black Women and Dental Care: It’s Importance for Continued Care, March 20, 2021

For further reading  about forced sterilisation on Black women and body politics, click here

Header Illustration: iStock