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Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing

Parent Organization: Social Good Fund
Type:

Activist Group
Formation:

2020
Parent Organization:

Social Good Fund

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The Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing brings together scholars, artists, and organizers to engage in Black feminist theory. 1 The organization, founded in 2020, is a fiscally sponsored project of the Social Good Fund. 2 3

The Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing formed after a decade of collaboration between Ugo Edu and Adeola Oni-Orisand, two medical anthropology graduate students at University of California, San Francisco and University of California, Berkeley respectively, who had studied Black feminist theory independently while doing research abroad. 4

Background

The Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing was, founded in 2020. 5 6 The term “collaboratory” is described as a “portmanteau of collective, collaboration, and laboratory” based on Black feminist thought. 7

The group claimed that the COVID-19 pandemic “offered a unique challenge and opportunity to deconstruct the conventional academic gathering and rebuild it with fresh eyes.” 8

The organization’s guiding principles are inspired by the 2017 book, Towards a Black Feminist Health Science Studies. The principles are interdisciplinarity and collaboration; honoring liberatory lineages; sustainable productivity; the importance of creativity, joy, and playfulness in future-making towards liberation; and an emphasis on community care and rest. 9

History

The Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing was founded by black feminist theorists Ugo Edu and Adeola Oni-Orisand. 10

Ugo Edu found that Black feminist theorists Sueli Carneiro and Sonia Beatriz dos Santos helped her understand sterilization and family planning in Brazil, according to the group. 11

Adeola Oni-Orisand researched pregnancy and Pentecostalism in Nigeria, which prompted her to find African feminist novelists like Buchi Emecheta and Flora Nwapa, according to the group. 12

The two founders focused on “Black Feminist Health Science Studies,” which was inspired by Moya Bailey and Whitney People’s article on the topic. 13

Projects

The University of California Summer Medical Anthropology Research Training Program, also known as UC-SMART, runs for six-weeks during the summer providing research training internships in collaboration with historically black colleges and universities and the University of Ibadan in Nigeria. 14

The group sponsors the Black Feminist Health Collaboratory, which is a three-day biennial international gathering of scholars, activists, organizers, and creative people that focus on research or community projects. 15 16

“Writing Health Through Black Feminist Theory” is a book lecture series that occurs biannually that includes interviews with authors of books on improving Black health through Black Feminist theory. Each event features two authors to discuss their recent book. 17

The group also develops syllabi to promote to teachers, scholars, health professionals, and activists who want to promote Black feminist theory in health education. 18

Leadership

Adeola Oni-Orisan is a co-founder and director of the Collaboratory for Black Feminist Health and Healing. She is a medical anthropologist and family doctor. Her research focuses on critical race theory, Black feminist studies, and science and technology studies to determine how Blackness and gender apply to health. She has researched reproductive health in Nigeria, Zambia, and the United States. She is the author of “To Be Delivered: Pregnant and Born Again in Nigeria.” 19

Ugo Edu is a co-founder and director of the Collaboratory. She is a medical anthropologist who researches reproductive and sexual health, gender, race, aesthetics, body knowledge, and body modifications. She is the author of “Family Planned: Racial Aesthetics, Sterilization, and Reproductive Fugitivity in Brazil.” She is an assistant professor in the African American Studies Department at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). 20

Teleola Onipede is the communications coordinator for the organization. She is a graduate of Tufts University where she majored in Biopsychology. 21

References

  1. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  2. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  3. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  4.  “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  5. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  6. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  7.  “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  8. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  9. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  10. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  11. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  12. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  13. “About.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024 https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/about
  14. “Projects.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/projects
  15. “Projects.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/projects
  16. “Black Feminist Health Collaboratory.” .” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/bfh-collaboratory.
  17. [1] “Projects.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/projects
  18.  “Projects.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/projects
  19. “People.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/people
  20. “People.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/people
  21. “People.” Collaboratory For Black Feminist Health and Healing. Accessed March 12, 2024. https://www.blackfeministcollab.com/people
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