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This year, as we honor the World's 100 Most Powerful Women , we also honor the women—the Black women—who have been instrumental in exposing racial inequity and are some of the most influential drivers for societal change. Kamala Harris, no. 3 on this year’s Power Women list, paid tribute to Black women in her first speech as Vice president elect. The group, she said, is “too often overlooked, but so often prove that they are the backbone of our democracy.” Stacey Abrams, who earned the 100th...

SAPELO ISLAND, Ga. — Fall is cane syrup season in pockets of the Deep South, where people still gather to grind sugar cane and boil its juice into dark, sweet syrup in iron kettles big enough to bathe in. This autumn, no cane syrup has been more significant than the batches Maurice Bailey and his friends made from the first purple ribbon sugar cane grown here on Sapelo Island since the 1800s. The 11-mile-long barrier island is home to the Salt Water Geechees , who can trace an unbroken line...

By Roy S. Johnson, December 4, 2020, AL.com. Danielle Lacey Chavers rolled the dice. Though she didn’t fully grasp the depth of the consequences. Not even as she rounded the corner inside a gated Trace Crossings community in Hoover and saw a fire truck leaving the cul-de-sac where her family lived. Or as she saw an ambulance and a phalanx of police cars in front of their home. Or realized it was a drug raid. The oldest of Chavers’s two sons, Jeremy, a teenager who had picked his younger...

By Nathan McCall, The New York Times, November 23, 2020 Decades ago, when I was a teenager growing up in Portsmouth, Va., my buddies and I constantly railed against the evils of “the system.” We viewed the system as a vast, amorphous establishment that worked to preserve White privilege and control Black folks’ lives. It was the 1970s, and as proof that our hatred of the White mainstream was justified, we had to look no further than our homes. We saw that our parents were beaten down,...

By La Quandra S. Nesbitt, Journal of Public Health Management & Practice (January/February 2021), December 2020 As the number of COVID-19 cases in the United States increased, and public reporting of demographic characteristics improved, the stark disparities in COVID-19–related incidence and mortality became evident. 1 While these disparities were alarming to many, for others, they illuminated the unfortunate inequities in health and health care that exist and persist in the United...

By Virgie Hoban, November 19, 2020, Berkeley News. It was a racist policy enacted over 80 years ago, but its aftermath dribbles on — all the way to the babies born today, new research shows. Using historical maps and modern birth data, UC Berkeley researchers have found that babies born in California neighborhoods historically redlined — denied federal investments based on the discriminatory lending practices of the 1930s — are now more likely to have poorer health outcomes. The study was...

NOVEMBER 17, 2020 5:08 AM AEDT Women with lower levels of choline delivered prematurely by 2 weeks, increasing risk of later mental health problems for their offspring. Researchers at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campu s have found that many pregnant Black Americans have low levels of choline, an essential nutrient that aids in prenatal brain development. Stress caused by institutional racism may play a role. The study, out now in Schizophrenia Bulletin , also found that these...

The exclusion of Indigenous people and other non-White communities in environmental and conservation work is, unfortunately, nothing new. For centuries, conservation has been driven by Eurocentric, Judeo-Christian belief structures that emphasize a distinct separation of “Man” and “Nature”—an ideology that does not mesh well with many belief structures, including those belonging to Indigenous communities. Before the onset of such religion through colonialist conquests, the overwhelming...

Proposals are due by Tuesday, October 27, 2020 at 5 P.M. (PST). Communities of Opportunity (COO) commits $725,000 to system and policy change projects led by and for Black communities in King County. Eligible partnerships of Black-led (including African descent and diaspora) organizations working on systems and policy change in Black communities may apply for funding through this Request for Proposals. Organizations must apply in partnerships of two or more working towards a common outcome.

By LaDawn Sullivan, Director of Leadership & Equity, lsullivan@denverfoundation.org . Established in June, the Black Resilience in Colorado (BRIC) Fund directs resources to address systemic racism and its impact on Black communities across the seven-county Metro Denver region. The Black Resilience in Colorado (BRIC) Fund application is now closed. Decisions on funding and grant awards will be made in mid-October. [ Please click here to read more ]

By Regine Jean-Charles, October 21, 2020, Ms Magazine. When Amy Coney Barrett described her children, it gave me chills—but not for the reasons most might expect. Despite the national political drama that is swirling, in many ways, last week’s Senate hearings to approve Justice Amy Coney Barrett were uneventful—especially in comparison to the confirmation hearings that took place two years ago for Brett Kavanaugh . But for me, as a Haitian American scholar who writes about representations of...

Curtis, E., Jones, R., Tipene-Leach, D. et al. Why cultural safety rather than cultural competency is required to achieve health equity: a literature review and recommended definition. Int J Equity Health 18, 174 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-019-1082-3 Abstract Background Eliminating indigenous and ethnic health inequities requires addressing the determinants of health inequities which includes institutionalised racism, and ensuring a health care system that delivers appropriate...