Histories of Eugenic Sterilization through A Reproductive Justice Lens

Coined and developed by a group of Black women in the 1990s, Reproductive Justice has become a necessary organizing framework in contemporary struggles for reproductive rights and freedoms. In addition to being an organizing framework, activists and scholars assert Reproductive Justice as an analytical lens for understanding systems and experiences of reproductive oppression. In this lecture, Dr. Natalie Lira explores what it means to apply a reproductive justice lens to histories of reproduction. Focusing on eugenic sterilization and sterilization abuse more broadly, Dr. Lira illustrates how a Reproductive Justice lens encourages new and necessary insights on the role of race, gender, and (dis)ability in legitimizing systems of reproductive oppression. The lecture also highlights how a Reproductive Justice lens encourages a broader understanding of resistance to reproductive oppression and the ways people assert and reclaim bodily autonomy