The Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center is a for-profit consulting business that offers “doula,” or pregnancy and birth advice, founded and run by Khye Tyson. The center not only offers traditional “doula” birth and pre-and post-birth services, but also offers “abortion doula” services and guidance for procuring abortions. In addition to these services, the center offers courses and workshops for organizations to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion as “birth justice” and will evaluate participant’s programs on DEI grounds. It embraces the left-of-center concept of “intersectionality” and holds that men can birth children. 1 2 3
Financials
As a for-profit company, the Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center does not have publicly available tax returns. The center website has a link to StartSomeGood.com, a crowdfunding website, but the link states that the project does not exist. 4
The left-of-center Groundswell Fund lists the center as being the recipient of grant funding, but the center’s profile page is blank, though dated to 2023. 5 6 As of March 2024, Groundswell’s tax filings for 2023 were not yet available to see the amount and nature of this grant.
Programs
The Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center offers traditional birthing doula services, but also offers “abortion doula” services and will consult with clients “regardless of the legality of abortion in the United States and Georgia.” 1
The center also offers services to various organizations to discuss “birth justice” and diversity, equity, and inclusion issues and to evaluate programs on DEI criteria. The center brochure for such training asks if participants are “ready to queer” their professional development and offers workshops on “redefining family,” “birth justice,” and “supporting queer and trans birthing families.” The center states that birth justice must be intersectional and offer to help organizations make space for non-white and non-heteronormative families. 2
Organization Philosophy
The Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center holds left-of-center views that emphasize intersectionality and diversity, equity, and inclusion. Notably, the center offers “abortion doula” services that will help guide clients. It emphasizes “intersectionality” in “birth justice” and accepts the idea that a man can birth children and promotes transgender identification. It provides resources on things such as “non-gestational parents,” “trans and gender expansive birthing/parenting,” “Black feminist thought,” and “how gender harms us.” 3 1 2 7
The organization’s resource list also includes a link to a guide on self-induced abortion and “self-managed abortion resources,” as well as an abortion clinic locator. 8
Khye Tyson, founder and principal of the Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center, characterizes the center as an “anti-capitalist doula business.” 9
Leadership
Khye Tyson is the founder and principal of the Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center. She founded the center in 2018 and has a history of working in various left-of-center activist capacities. She is a birth doula, and identifies as “gender expansive/non-binary, queer, [and] neurodivergent” and states that Black people are facing a genocide in the U.S. She states that her goal is to achieve “sovereignty” for the Black community and that to achieve this there is a need to “heal from generational and cultural traumas.” Tyson identifies with “they/them” pronouns. 3
References
- “Doula Services.” Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center. Accessed March 11, 2024. http://kuluntu.center/doulaservices.
- “For Organizations.” Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://kuluntu.center/organizations.
- “About Us.” Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://kuluntu.center/about-us.
- “StartSomeGood.” StartSomeGood. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://startsomegood.com/kulunturjc.
- “Grantees | Groundswell Fund.” Groundswell Fund. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://groundswellfund.org/grantees/.
- “Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center | Groundswell Fund.” Groundswell Fund. April 7, 2023. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://groundswellfund.org/grantees/kuluntu-reproductive-justice-center-2/.
- “Kuluntu’s Resource Hub.” Notion. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://www.notion.so.
- “Kuluntu’s Resource Hub: Abortion.” Notion. Accessed March 11, 2024. https://www.notion.so.
- “Portfolio.” Kuluntu Reproductive Justice Center. Accessed March 11, 2024. http://kuluntu.center/press.