Monday, Mar. 8 was International Women’s Day and to kick off the celebration, the Women’s Studies Program at NEIU welcomed Professor Dorothy Roberts to speak about the current state of affairs in science in regarding to women of color and reproduction.
Laurie Fuller and Muriel Duster, Head of Women’s Studies and Dean of Academic Development respectively, cooperatively planned this event to have the Harvard Law School graduate to take the podium.
“One could think women have reached full equality,” Duster began, before quickly putting down the notion. She then said that “great improvements have been made” throughout the course of women’s history.
“It’s important to remember where we come from.” said Duster, making a notion to women’s past, current and future struggle for equal rights.
Lakeesha Harris, a student here at NEIU also spoke a few words about her experience with maternity rights being a woman of color.
“I wasn’t familiar of the word autonomy,” Harris said, but it all changed once Roberts’ book found her. She spoke on how women of the African Diaspora are the victims of the victims of this crime, which was the lead to the guest speaker Roberts.
Dorothy Roberts is the author of two books regarding African American maternal struggles throughout time. She brought to light a story of a past encounter about Laurie Griffin and her imprisonment due to bearing a child while testing positive for drugs.
This experience led her to say that the government has a belief of sorts that, “Black women need to be regulated to protect society.” Also, that they, “Are not suitable mothers in the first place.”
“This is a modern incarnation of slave women,” said Roberts comparing African American child bearing mothers to the struggles of slave mothers on the plantation.
Certain groups of power have gone great lengths to monitor the reproductive efforts of women of color. Some efforts involve public demoralizing and humiliation. Robert makes note of a large hypocrisy in American society with depreciation of women (mainly of color) who have children and are on welfare, but glorify “Octomoms” who don’t have the sufficient amount of resources to take care of their children.
Science has also played a big role in undermining the rights of mothers of color. Roberts listed several different companies that use genetics in order to unlock and apparently “solve” the mysteries of race. One example she showed went as far advertising a drug to remedy heart disease in African Americans only.
“We must undress the technology that supposedly defines race and discover the fine line between ‘difference vs. equality’,” said Roberts, as she looked towards the future. “There’s one race, the human race and we should fight for our place in the world.”