Onyinyechi Jessica Ogwumike— Radical Redress: Black Birth Workers Respond to Maternal Mortality Onyinyechi Jessica Ogwumike (she/they) (Class of 2019) graduated from Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts & Sciences with departmental honors in African-American studies. Jessica completed pre-health coursework, and their primary passions include birth and racial justice. At Northwestern, Jessica worked as a Writing Place tutor, organized toward the improvement of the university’s mental health resources and the well-being of Black students, and co-founded an artist collective for creatives of color. They are a labor doula and look forward to serving the Lawndale community as a Northwestern University Public Interest Program (NUPIP) fellow, working as a care manager of Lawndale Christian Health Center. Jessica hopes to go on to develop a birth work practice, using empathy and curious communication to support people and communities as they grow lives that center healing justice and connection.
and witnessing the re-orientation of national conversations that Black birth workers perform via social media. Where do you see the future direction of this work leading? I would like to see future researchers attend to how the conversation surrounding Black maternal mortality post-media sensation has and has not influenced policy change, and the efficacy of such policy for Black birthing populations specifically.
What is your research, in a nutshell? My research responds to predominant depictions of Black maternal life and death by centering Black birthing people and birth workers’ counterrepresentation of Black birth. How did you come to your research topic? I came to a passion for alternative birth storytelling by attending events hosted by Chicago Volunteer Doulas 170
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