Birth Justice. A Philosophy of Reproduction

The catchphrase ‘the right to choose’ has been around for half a century. Yet fertility is still characterised by injustice: the criminalisation of abortion, higher mother and baby mortality rates among people of colour and mounting evidence of transgressive behaviour in obstetrics. To what extent have we succeeded in realising the well-known catchphrase?

In this lecture, Van der Waal traces the expropriation of our wombs genealogically, back to witch hunts, slavery and colonialism. With the help of thinkers like Michel Foucault, Silvia Federici, Achille Mbembe and Shulamith Firestone, she exposes fertility politics, as well as unrolling a new philosophy of ‘reproductive justice’: a form of liberation that is collective in nature, rather than individualistic.

Speaker
Rodante van der Waal, Philosopher, Midwife, Writer, Poet