Revisiting ‘Killing the Black Body,’ 20 years later
"'Killing the Black Body,' published in 1997, chronicles the war against black reproduction, from slavery to present day. The chattel property of their masters, enslaved black women were valuable for their reproductive labor and had no legal right to control it. Their owners had the legal power to exert complete control over their bodies, deciding when they would have children, and with whom. The more children an enslaved woman produced—to be owned and sold at her master’s discretion—the more valuable she was, which Roberts says 'led to a regime of practices, and laws, and ways of thinking about black women’s bodies that permitted coercion of their reproduction.'
"When slavery ended and the wombs of black women could no longer be seized for financial gain, policies were put in place to contain, control, and punish black reproduction, which was deemed a danger to society. Roberts says these oppressive policies continued through the #eugenics era, and into the 1960s and ’70s, and were being implemented at the time she was conducting her research.
For the book’s 20th anniversary, “Killing the Black Body” has been reissued, with a new preface from Roberts, who reflects on its publication and findings two decades later. She has continued her work on contesting anti-black reproduction policies, and says many of the programs have intensified.
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"Restrictions on the right to abortion have also escalated since the book was published. Roberts says states have passed hundreds of laws in the last 20 years, which disproportionately affect black women, designed to keep women from accessing abortion services.
"'Under the [Trump] administration, there are proposals to restrict access to family planning and other needed health care for women even more,' she says.
"At the conclusion of 'Killing the Black Body,' Roberts proposed a new way of theorizing about reproductive freedom focused on #SocialJustice. She says a positive development over the past two decades has been the burgeoning of a reproductive justice movement led by women of color that has contested not only harmful reproductive policies, but also 'the inadequate framework of choice as the basis for advocating for social change.'
"'#ReproductiveJustice is grounded in the struggle for social justice that goes beyond an approach that focuses on individual women’s choices,' she says. 'That has proven to be a much more powerful and inclusive way of thinking about and advocating for reproductive freedom.'"
https://penntoday.upenn.edu/research/revisiting-killing-the-black-body-20-years-later
