Loretta J. Ross is a cofounder of the SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective and the cocreator, in 1994, of the theory of reproductive justice. She has addressed women's issues, hate groups, and human rights on CNN and in the New York Times, Time magazine, Los Angeles Times, and USA Today.
Rickie Solinger is a historian and curator and the author or editor of many books about reproductive politics, including Wake Up Little Susie: Single Pregnancy and Race before Roe v. Wade.
by Loretta Ross and Rickie Solinger
University of California Press
3/21/2017, paperback
SKU: 9780520288201
Reproductive Justice is a first-of-its-kind primer providing a comprehensive yet succinct description of the field. Written by two legendary scholar-activists, Reproductive Justice introduces students to an intersectional analysis of race, class, and gender politics. Clearly showing how reproductive justice is a political movement of reproductive rights and social justice, the authors illuminate how, for example, a low-income, physically -disabled woman, living in West Texas with no viable public transportation, no healthcare clinic, and no living-wage employment opportunities, faces a complex web of structural obstacles as she contemplates her sexual and reproductive intentions. Putting the lives and lived experience of women of color at the center of the book, and using a human rights analysis, the authors show how reproductive justice is significantly different from the pro-choice/anti-abortion debates that have long-dominated the headlines and mainstream political conflict.
In a period in which women's reproductive lives are imperiled, Reproductive Justice provides an essential guide to understanding and mobilizing around women's rights in the 21st century.
Reviews:
"Controlling reproduction and the bodies of women seems to be the first step in every hierarchy. That's why reproductive justice--women having power over our own bodies--is the crucial first step toward any democracy, any human rights, and any justice." -- Gloria Steinem
"Now more than ever, as reproductive autonomy and the rights of people of color are under attack, we at Planned Parenthood know our fates are intertwined. The reproductive justice movement--which comes directly from the expertise and the lived experience of women of color--illuminated a path forward to hold the line on the rights we have won and to expand the rights of all people. We need to know the history laid out in Reproductive Justice, because we need to not repeat the ugliness of the past. Our strategies need to be inclusive and intersectional, because when women of color and those most affected by reproductive oppression are free to make their own decisions about their health and their bodies, we all win. None of us are free until we're all free."-- Cecile Richards, President, Planned Parenthood Federation of America
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