Women And The Politics Of Sterilization

In 2003, North Carolina became the third U.S. state to apologize and the first to call for compensation to victims of state-ordered sterilizations carried out between 1929 and 1975. The decision was prompted largely by a series of articles in the Winston-Salem Journal. The stories were inspired in part by the meticulous research of Johanna Schoen, who was granted unique access to the papers of the North Carolina Eugenics Board and to summaries of the case histories of nearly 7600 victims--men, women, and children as young as ten years old--most of whom had been sterilized without their consent. In 2011, a gubernatorial task force held public hearings to gather testimony from the victims and their families before recommending in early 2012 that each living victim be granted $50,000 compensation. The restitution proposal requires legislative approval before funds can be dispersed. In this UNC Press Short, excerpted from Choice and Coercion, Schoen explains the legal construction of North Carolina's sterilization program, which lasted far longer than similar programs in other states, and demonstrates through the stories of several women how the state was able to deny women who were poor, uneducated, African American, or "promiscuous" reproductive autonomy in multiple ways. UNC Press Shorts excerpt compelling, shorter narratives from selected best-selling books published by the University of North Carolina Press and present them as engaging, quick reads. Presented exclusively as e-books, these shorts present essential concepts, defining moments, and concise introductions to topics. They are intended to stir the imagination and courage exploration of the original publications from which they are drawn.

This collection of twenty-four original essays by leading scholars in American women's history highlights the most recent important scholarship on the key debates and future directions of this popular and contemporary field. Covers the breadth of American Women's history, including the colonial family, marriage, health, sexuality, education, immigration, work, consumer culture, and feminism. Surveys and evaluates the best scholarship on every important era and topic. Includes expanded bibliography of titles to guide further research.

An in-depth investigation of the forced sterilization of Aboriginal women carried out by the Canadian government.

Facing Eugenics is a social history of sexual sterilization operations in twentieth-century Canada. Looking at real-life experiences of men and women who, either coercively or voluntarily, participated in the largest legal eugenics program in Canada, it considers the impact of successive legal policies and medical practices on shaping our understanding of contemporary reproductive rights. The book also provides deep insights into the broader implications of medical experimentation, institutionalization, and health care in North America. Erika Dyck uses a range of historical evidence, including medical files, court testimony, and personal records to place mental health and intelligence at the centre of discussions regarding reproductive fitness. Examining acts of resistance alongside heavy-handed decisions to sterilize people considered “unfit,” Facing Eugenics illuminates how reproductive rights fit into a broader discussion of what constitutes civil liberties, modern feminism, and contemporary psychiatric survivor and disability activism.

Original and compelling, Laura Briggs's Reproducing Empire shows how, for both Puerto Ricans and North Americans, ideologies of sexuality, reproduction, and gender have shaped relations between the island and the mainland. From science to public policy, the "culture of poverty" to overpopulation, feminism to Puerto Rican nationalism, this book uncovers the persistence of concerns about motherhood, prostitution, and family in shaping the beliefs and practices of virtually every player in the twentieth-century drama of Puerto Rican colonialism. In this way, it sheds light on the legacies haunting contemporary debates over globalization. Puerto Rico is a perfect lens through which to examine colonialism and globalization because for the past century it has been where the United States has expressed and fine-tuned its attitudes toward its own expansionism. Puerto Rico's history holds no simple lessons for present-day debate over globalization but does unearth some of its history. Reproducing Empire suggests that interventionist discourses of rescue, family, and sexuality fueled U.S. imperial projects and organized American colonialism. Through the politics, biology, and medicine of eugenics, prostitution, and birth control, the United States has justified its presence in the territory's politics and society. Briggs makes an innovative contribution to Puerto Rican and U.S. history, effectively arguing that gender has been crucial to the relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico, and more broadly, to U.S. expansion elsewhere.