Overview

Battling Over Birth: Black Women and the Maternal Health Care Crisis reveals hard truths--powerful findings on the role of racism, coercion, inadequate prenatal care, the pressures undermining breastfeeding, and the lack of access to alternatives to a broken maternal health-care system as key threads of black women's birth experiences. Battling Over Birth, a new human rights report from Black Women Birthing Justice, shares stories from over 100 women who recently gave birth in California. The report reveals the culture of fear and coercion that has transformed birth into a battleground, a deep lack of trust of our hospitals, and a broken maternal healthcare system that fails too many black women. The report shakes up our understanding of where state violence happens, and who it happens to; putting the human rights spotlight onto a system that is often unaccountable to black communities. Battling Over Birth also provides solutions. It makes a series of recommendations, including community accountability boards to hold hospitals accountable; increased access to midwifery and doula-care; recruitment and training of more health-care professionals of color; culturally-competent, empowering prenatal and postpartum care; greater access to home birth and birth centers; and a sharp reduction in the use of C-sections.

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Julia Chinyere Oparah is a transformational leader, executive coach, social justice educator, and activist scholar. Oparah has published extensively on black maternal health, decarceral politics, research justice, and transnational black feminisms. She is cofounder of Black Women Birthing Justice, and coauthor of Birthing Justice: Black Women, Pregnancy and Childbirth, a seminal text that puts black women at the center of debates about the crisis in maternal health care. She is lead author of Battling Over Birth, a human rights report that challenges existing research paradigms used to investigate black women's perinatal health, using a research justice framework. More recently she has published on Black birthworkers and Birthing mamas during the COVID-19 pandemic. Chinyere is a National Equity Project fellow and member of the Center for Executive Coaching. She lives in Oakland with her partner, daughter, and labradoodle. She can be found at the Center for Liberated Leadership. Talita Oseguera is a midwife, full-spectrum doula, breastfeeding peer counselor, placenta encapsulator, advocate for reproductive justice, and mother. She recently completed nurse midwifery training at the University of California, San Francisco. As a graduate student, she worked as a field nurse with SOLARS, one of the first, large-scale studies designed by women of color partnering with pregnant through postpartum Black and Brown women and individuals to understand the impact of stress, anxiety, and racism on preterm birth in addition to resilience and coping as protective factors. She is a former cocoordinator of the Family Planning and Reproductive Choices elective within the Obgyn Department at UCSF and member of Nurse Students of Color. Talita coauthored Battling Over Birth: Black Women and the Maternal Health Care Crisis, the second publication of Oakland-based Black Women Birthing Justice, of which she is a collective member. Her interests include reproductive justice, honoring and amplifying the voices, experiences, and issues of Black women and individuals across the sexual, reproductive and perinatal continuum, walking alongside birth workers of color who reflect the communities they serve, and improving care for and with Black women and individuals. Linda Jones is an award-winning narrator and NYC actor with a penchant for dark edges and curious truths. Weaned on du Maurier and Hitchcock, Kafka and Poe-tales of mystery, adventure, and intrigue spawned a decades-long career with writers in new work, development, and narration. She has narrated for Penguin Random House, Recorded Books, Audible Studios, and Dreamscape, as well as a variety of independent authors and publishers. She has a BFA from Ithaca College. She lives in Brooklyn with writer John C. Foster and their dog, Coraline, in an apartment filled-to-bursting, floor-to-ceiling, corner-to-absolute-corner with books. Dantia Hudson is coauthor of Battling Over Birth: Black Women and the Maternal Health Crisis. Helen Arega is coauthor of Battling Over Birth: Black Women and the Maternal Health Care Crisis. Deanna Anthony, an original southern belle and former beauty queen, is an audiobook narrator, actress, singer, dancer, and voice-over artist who lives in Los Angeles, California. Touring by land and sea, both nationally and internationally, she has performed at more than over fifty regional theaters and concert halls. She has appeared in many plays, musicals, independent and industrial films, commercials, and live events. Whether nonfiction or fiction in genre, storytelling is at the essence of what she does every day. Bringing a broad range of skills and a vibrant confidence of delivery, Deanna uses her voice to bring life to art and enjoys the collaborative creative process. Her voice has been described as warm, vibrant, and conversational. Whether delivering inspirational, humorous, or dramatic tones, Deanna remains committed to the text. Her audiobook releases include nonfiction, children's, romance, cozy mystery, poetry, sci-fi genres, and erotica under a pseudonym. When not working in the booth, on camera or in the theater, Deanna teaches voice technique and performance to teens and adults from her home in Los Angeles, and enjoys cooking baking, quilting, reading, and writing with family and friends.

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