CSRPC Presents New Writing Black Women and Reproductive Justice

5733 S Woodlawn Ave,Chicago IL 60637

10 May, 2022

Description

Authors, Natalie Y. Moore and Dolen Perkins-Valdez discuss their new books on Black women's reproductive justice. Join us to celebrate new writing by award-winning authors, Natalie Y. Moore and Dolen Perkins-Valdez centering Black women and reproductive justice. They will be in conversation with Candice Norcott, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at UChicago. This event is co-sponsored by the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, Biological Sciences Diversity and Inclusion and the Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture at the University of Chicago. Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez Inspired by true events that rocked the nation, Take My Hand is a profoundly moving novel about a Black nurse in post-segregation Alabama who blows the whistle on a terrible wrong done to her patients, from the New York Times bestselling author of Wench. Montgomery, Alabama, 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend has big plans to make a difference, especially in her African American community. At the Montgomery Family Planning Clinic, she intends to help women make their own choices for their lives and bodies. But when her first week on the job takes her down a dusty country road to a worn-down one-room cabin, she’s shocked to learn that her new patients, Erica and India, are children—just eleven and thirteen years old. Neither of the Williams sisters has even kissed a boy, but they are poor and Black, and for those handling the family’s welfare benefits, that’s reason enough to have the girls on birth control. As Civil grapples with her role, she takes India, Erica, and their family into her heart. Until one day she arrives at the door to learn the unthinkable has happened, and nothing will ever be the same for any of them. Decades later, with her daughter grown and a long career in her wake, Dr. Civil Townsend is ready to retire, to find her peace, and to leave the past behind. But there are people and stories that refuse to be forgotten. That must not be forgotten. Because history repeats what we don’t remember. The Billboard by Natalie Y. Moore The Billboard is about a fictional Black women’s clinic in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood on the South Side and its fight with a local gadfly running for City Council who puts up a provocative billboard: “Abortion is genocide. The most dangerous place for a Black child is his mother’s womb,” spurring on the clinic to fight back with their own provocative sign: “Black women take care of their families by taking care of themselves. Abortion is self-care. #Trust Black Women.” As a play and book, The Billboard is a cultural force that treats abortion as more than pro-life or pro-choice. Both books will be on-site and available for purchase. Seminary Co-op Bookstore will provide book sales. Reception to follow.