At the Dawn of 2024 - Brief Words of Encouragement

Dearest sojourners,

Warmest greetings from the Center’s new home in Atlanta, GA. As outlined in my June 2023 blogpost, the Center is intentionally pausing externally-facing activities, but know that we remain as engaged and committed as ever. To honor that commitment to the pause, I share only a briefest set of reminders here.

Today is the first day of 2024. Sadly, there are many signs that the coming year(s) will be tumultuous and dangerous. Even so, this is not a time for us to cower. It is a time to get involved with ongoing struggles. To prioritize deep understandings over buzzword-based chatter. To witness. To speak. To act—boldly, but not recklessly for health justice. To preserve our humanity.

For those who may feel discouraged or overwhelmed, here are several additional reminders.

• Celebrate. Remember, dear sojourners, this work is extensive and difficult, but you are indeed doing it! Much of the labor is not readily perceived or acknowledged by others. Your peers or institutions may not value it beyond whatever immediate gains it affords them. However, we are motivated to do the work by a commitment to our community. Or, because we dream of a better world and know that world is possible. Those who benefit from your work may never know how much effort you expend doing it. You must find ways to recognize and celebrate each important milestone yourself. Perhaps the day will come when we can sit down and recount them together.

• Rest. Carve out the time you need for rest. The best models of health justice do not ignore our own rights to physical, mental and spiritual well-being. You deserve the space and time to care for yourself, your team members and your loved ones while doing the work. There is no need to apologize for that.

• On Saviors. The emerging challenges will not be solved because a public health savior developed a cure. They will be solved because a movement toward health justice demanded something different and worked to make it happen. Efforts to achieve health justice require the collective efforts of many people. This orientation is at odds with academia, which promotes a single academic “star” who operates in isolation from others. Surround yourself with other collectivist-oriented colleagues.

• On isolation. Do not isolate yourself. Threats to the attainment of “optimal health for all”. include various forms of racism, climate change, attacks on reproductive rights, etc. Therefore, it is important to build coalitions to synergistically achieve shared goals.

• On the evolution of racism. Be aware that racism is evolving in the early 21st century. It is both subtler and more complex. Realign your intellectual work to reflect this.

Some of you are feeling discouraged or overwhelmed. You are important. And so, too, is your work. Keep your head up. Take one small step at a time. And, be sure to get the professional support needed to thrive.

Yours in struggle,

Chandra

… ever committed to impactful movement toward health justice in the early 21st century…

“Hey sis, rest is not a reward": Exploring ways to advance reproductive justice through joy, rest and liberation

Reproductive Justice in the time of COVID

“Hey sis, rest is not a reward”: Exploring ways to advance reproductive justice through joy, rest and liberation

We recently published qualitative findings from interviews we conducted as part of the COVID-19 Storytelling Project in a paper titled “A Qualitative Analysis on Sexual and Reproductive Health Needs and Issues During COVID -19 Using a Reproductive Justice Framework”[1]. The findings we published are a continuation of reproductive justice work that communities have been leading long before the pandemic. These findings have inspired me to seek out those who have been doing this hard work for decades. The paper also highlights the relationship between rest and joy as pathways to reproductive justice, particularly in the context of covid where existing disparities have only worsened. I want to explore the ways in which we center our joy, rest, and liberation in reproductive justice work, especially when working within a culture that continues to show us they do not value our lived experience.

So often throughout different spaces, be it nonprofit, tech, medical or research, Black folks, and other communities of color are charged with leading discussions, interventions and other initiatives to advance health and reproductive justice. And this is how it should be, right? Nothing about us without us! No doubt. The leaders of the reproductive justice movement defined it as “...a human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children in safe and sustainable communities [2]. And as the reproductive justice framework promotes, we absolutely should be up front and center, leading, demanding power, taking up space, and in turn receiving agency, resources, and adequate compensation for our efforts. But what happens when we go home? Or close our laptops, and try to shake off the day, are we able to come home to ourselves? Is our value defined by what we do for the movement? How is our rest connected to the larger movement?

Here in Los Angeles, the movement has been sustained by many organizations such as Black Women for Wellness and California Latinas for Reproductive Justice. These impactful groups have locked arms with the community and have been fighting for equity for decades. Black Women for Wellness (BWW), a nonprofit formed in 1997 to support the well-being and health of Black babies, support systems change and policy and advocacy [3]. BWW provides health and reproductive health education to the community as well as advocate for policies and research that support environmental justice. This intersection of reproductive justice and environmental justice is critical to the work of centering joy and liberation. We know that Black people have been denied access to green space through divestment and redlining [4]. Personally, access to parks where I can walk around, lay out under some trees, and just experience life is so vital to my well-being, allowing me to restore so that I may continue doing this work.

California Latinas for Reproductive Justice (CLRJ) is another well-known and appreciated organization that centers the experiences of Latina/xs by employing a reproductive framework to promote the human rights of Latinx community [5]. CLRJ focuses on supporting access to quality education, living wages, and violence prevention as pathways to reproductive health. Both of these organizations center their priority population and provide resources and leadership opportunities for both Black and Latinx folks to advocate for reproductive justice.

These organizations remind us that this work requires stamina, yet, have we thought enough about what we need to maintain that stamina? We cannot keep pouring from an empty cup. As Tricia Hersey promotes through her “Nap Ministry” work, “rest is resistance” [6]. Choosing to step away, or literally lie down for a nap, when the world would rather see you work until you die is itself a revolutionary act for us Black folk. But not just individual rest, a collective rest where we encourage and hold space for one another to take the time we need to fill our cups. One where we can extend grace and allow one another to be.

Reproductive justice movements have advanced community-based demands by taking to the streets. Protesting. Being loud and proud. But how do we take care of ourselves in ways that allow us to be able to be our best when we show up? White supremacist capitalist culture teaches us that we must cope with our struggles by working harder, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps, but as Audre Lorde says “the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house.” Is there a way to imagine a different way of being as we do this work. One that allows us to focus on our individual and collective healing so that it benefits ourselves and the movement? One that allows us to prioritize our joy, liberation and pleasure as pathways to deep healing. We acknowledge that rest and joy may look differently depending on the community, and that we can hold both joy and grief at the same time.

Resting and doing less, unapologetically, is the move for us Black folks, taking our time, saying no to carrying the burden of advocacy and education of the masses. Going where we are celebrated, not just tolerated. This newly popularized movement of “quiet quitting” is old news for us as we have been doing this for generations…holding onto our dignity and quietly leaving spaces where we have not been valued, seen or heard, returning to our chosen families and communities. Our quiet strength is firmly rooted in our collectivism, the reality that many of us thrive because we exist in an ecosystem of caregivers, mentors, play cousins, aunties, grandmothers, and best friends. They are the soil that nourishes us.

Rest is also the soil that sustains us. Science provides evidence of this as stress reduction is clinically proven to reduce the possibility of adverse birth outcomes for Black people [7]. Safely planted, we can reflect, restore and grow. Beyond simply surviving to thrive. As a childfree woman who wants to have children eventually, I want them to come into a body that is well rested and nourished.

For me this looks like going to the ocean, crying and writing, releasing, laying under my favorite trees at my local park, saying no to requests that I do additional work and not feeling badly about it, moving my body, taking mental health days, and really just shifting from doing more to being more. It is hard to make this shift, as it goes against everything I have been taught to be as a Black woman working in predominantly white institutions. But I am enough, we are enough.

In the famous words of Congresswoman Maxine Waters, I am “reclaiming my time.” Reclaiming time that was taken away from my ancestors who were forced to care for everyone else but not afforded the time needed to care for themselves. Advancing the right to bodily autonomy and self-determination includes finding out what rest looks like for you. I hope you will read the article [1] published in the fall 2022 installment of the RACE Series in Ethnicity & Disease and are inspired to continue on our collective journey toward reproductive justice. And to my beautiful Black folk, put your phone on silent mode and find out what brings your spirit peace and joy. It is our time to be still. To breathe. To come home to ourselves. Just to be.

About the Author

Nicole V. Jones is a researcher, health equity strategist and healer of systems whose work focuses on improving health outcomes through dismantling systemic racism, particularly in the healthcare system. Nicole advocates for philanthropic investments in Black community-lead strategies and organizations whose work centers Black joy, healing and safety, with a focus on birth equity. Nicole is a recent MPH graduate of the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health where she worked closely with the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Public Health as a qualitative researcher. Currently, Nicole is a Program Officer at First 5 LA and serves on the management team of the African American Infant and Maternal Mortality (AAIMM) Initiative which seeks to reduce Black infant and maternal mortality by disrupting the pathway to physiological stress through promoting safe and joyous births. Nicole has worked on a number of racial equity-based health initiatives including doulas, anti-racism trainings for hospitals and guaranteed basic income pilots to improve Black maternal and child health outcomes. She is a proud, third generation Los Angeles native who loves to travel the world, particularly the African Diaspora and learn about the richness and nuances of dance, food, birthing and healing from different cultural lenses.

You can contact Nicole at her LinkedIn page.

Reference

1. de la Rocha P, Sudhinaraset M, Jones N, Kim C, Cabral, Amani B. A qualitative analysis on reproductive health needs and issues during COVID-19 using a reproductive justice framework. Ethn Dis. 2022;32(4):357-372; 10.18865/ed.32.4.357

2. Reproductive Justice. (n.d.). Sister Song. Retrieved September 25, 2022, from https://www.sistersong.net/reproductive-justice

3. About Us—Black Women for Wellness. (n.d.). Retrieved September 25, 2022, from https://bwwla.org/about-us/

4. Lewis, J. (n.d.). Walking on a Redline: Did Discriminatory U.S. Housing Policies Affect Greenspace Development? Environmental Health Perspectives, 129(3), 034004. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP9033

5. What We Do | California Latinas for Reproductive Justice. (n.d.). Retrieved September 25, 2022, from https://californialatinas.org/about-us/what-we-do/

6. The Nap Ministry. (n.d.). The Nap Ministry. Retrieved September 25, 2022, from https://thenapministry.wordpress.com/

7. Liu, S. R., & Glynn, L. M. (2022). The contribution of racism-related stress and adversity to disparities in birth outcomes: Evidence and research recommendations. F&S Reports, 3(2, Supplement), 5–13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xfre.2021.10.003

From the Director...

June 30, 2023

From the Director

These reflections have been difficult to write.

Like so many of you, I am deeply troubled by the efficiency with which racial capitalism and white supremacy are reconfiguring society. I am deeply saddened by the ease with which people dismiss the humanity of those perceived as other. What troubles me most, however, is that in rushing to act quickly, health justice advocates may find ourselves drifting into this new phase of the battle with little understanding of the terrain on which it is being fought. (1)

The early 21st century is clearly a pivotal moment in the US. (2,3) In my assessment, it marks a new era of racial capitalism—one that critical race theorists and others have yet to fully understand. (4) In order to be able to continue to serve in a leading role in this new era, the center will take an intentional hiatus from our externally facing activities to focus intensively on distilling lessons from the past five years and charting a bold new course to confront the emerging national and global contexts of racialization on their terms. This is the last newsletter you will receive from us in this configuration of the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health.

With seed funding from the Fielding School of Public Health and the support of many colleagues, I was thrilled to launch the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health on the inaugural Indigenous People’s Day in 2017. My goal was for it to serve as a leader in advancing a bold movement for racial justice within the field of public health and beyond it. I feel humbled that the Center has been far more influential than I had planned for at the time. In recent years, many new centers have popped up in schools and programs of public health in response to racism intersecting the COVID pandemic. Some of them are thoughtfully designed, others are merely opportunistically pursuing the resources now available to conduct work on the health implications of racism. The hiatus this Center is about to embark on will help to ensure it cannot be conflated with the latter.

The work of the Center would not have been possible without the support of so many people. It is impossible to name all of you. Still, I thank you. It has been a privilege to struggle together toward a shared vision of beloved community.

The fierce team of Rebekah Israel Cross, Natalie Bradford, Ale Cabral and Porchia Toussaint launched this center. Each of you is precious to me. Thank you for your willingness to join me on what may have seemed like a wild journey at the time. That first year was magical. James Huynh and Millicent Robinson each served briefly as staff around the tumultuous beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Terence Keel, Kia Skrine Jeffers and Bita Amani graciously served as faculty leaders. As Associate Director for the Arts, Kia reminded us that the work cannot be reduced to empirical knowledge production. She hosted public-facing programs that centered the well-being of black women and communities, and reached broad audiences, including nurse scientists and community-based researchers. Bita has served as the lead co-chair of the COVID-19 Task Force on Racism & Equity. She has been my partner in fundraising, policy- and community-facing outreach, research, translation and dissemination of findings for use by community partners. Mienah Sharif and Paris “AJ” Adkins-Jackson completed postdoctoral fellowships and then went on to begin tenure track appointments where they are launching careers that challenge the field of public health from within. Mienah has continued to collaborate with the center and play a role in shaping the development of an anti-racism center at her new academic home. No one has sustained a core role longer than Consuela Abotsi-Kowu. She has been a student volunteer, center coordinator, data specialist on the COVID-19 Task Force on Racism & Equity, as well as the project assistant and project manager for the multi-million dollar intervention, Project REFOCUS. Consuela, you are an exemplary colleague from whom I have learned a lot. Thank you for continuing on this adventure with me. To the members of the Center’s Executive Board: Robin D.G. Kelley, Margaret Prescod, Barbara Krimgold, Collins Airhihenbuwa, Keith Norris, Gil Gee and Camara Jones, thank you for helping me to navigate the kinds of challenges that emerge when trying to carry out this work with integrity. Faculty, student, staff and community affiliates of the center whether based at UCLA or elsewhere, you are sources of inspiration and models of courage. Continue to forge ahead knowing others are working in solidarity with you. We are fortunate to have the generosity of many donors and advocates, including Vic Schoenbach and Phyllis Chestang, who generously shared financial support, recent publications and other materials with the center on a recurring basis. Your contributions that all of you have made are incredibly valuable, not only because of the resources they provide (for instance, to be able to hire students and staff), but also because you are letting us know that you value the work we are doing. My sincerest gratitude to you. Janet E. Dandridge donated a provocative work of installation art, one large component of which still hangs on the Center wall. Many, many volunteers, including but certainly not limited to Taylor Rogers, Ezinne Nwankwo, Anna Hing, Erin Manalo-Pedro, Adrian Bacong, and Anna-Michelle McSorley, who is continuing the Anti-Colonialism Collective from her new home at New York University, hosted events or participated in activities that sustained our relationships with community partners. The UCLA Fielding School of Public Health’s dean’s office shared our work with donors and the stellar team in the Office of Marketing and Communications championed our activities and affiliates in various publications. If you participated in any of our many activities, you also benefited from conversations we regularly had with our closest community partners. Particularly warm thanks go to Felica Jones and Healthy African American Families, the Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders, Black Alliance for Just Immigration and Stop LAPD Spying Coalition. Over the last two years, I have relied heavily on my center coordinator extraordinaire, E. Minelle David, whose ideas are valuable to me and whose thoughtfulness and love come through in how she curates our weekly newsletter, interacts with others, and addresses the many requests that come across her desk. Minelle, it is a blessing to work with you.

Folks (i.e., everyone who has supported us whether named or not), together we built a home and a community; that will continue. Together, we established the feasibility of using Critical Race Theory/Public Health Critical Race Practice (PHCRP) (5) to conduct anti-racist, community-engaged health equity work. That will continue. I am incredibly proud of the foundation we built. Yes. It was difficult to build it. I am extraordinarily grateful for your commitment to the work; I know that you were still fighting the good fight even when doing so came at great personal or professional cost. Please be encouraged as we move into this next phase knowing that your efforts have provided the institution (UCLA and the Fielding School of Public Health), our communities and the field with much more on which to draw as they forge ahead for health justice.

Thank you everyone for the privilege and the responsibility of this work. I look forward to reconnecting when we get to the other side.

With love and for health justice,

Chandra

1.         Bowleg L. "The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House": Ten Critical Lessons for Black and Other Health Equity Researchers of Color. Health Educ Behav. 2021;48(3):237-249.

2.         Jung M-K, Costa Vargas JH, Bonilla-Silva E, eds. State of White Supremacy: Racism, Governance, and the United States. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press; 2011.

3.         Bonilla-Silva E, Glover KS. "We are all Americans": The Latin Americanization of race relations in the United States. In: Krysan M, Lewis AE, eds. The changing terrain of race and ethnicity. New York: Russell Sage Foundation; 2004:149-183.

4.         Krieger N. Got Theory? On the 21st c. CE Rise of Explicit use of Epidemiologic Theories of Disease Distribution: A Review and Ecosocial Analysis. Current Epidemiology Reports. 2014;1:45-56.

5.         Ford CL, Airhihenbuwa CO. Commentary: Just What is Critical Race Theory and What's it Doing in a Progressive Field like Public Health? - PMC (nih.gov) Ethn Dis. 2018;28(Suppl 1):223-230.

Congratulations to Dr. Ezinne Nwankwo & Dr. Taylor Rogers!

On Friday, June 16, 2023, two anchors among the student affiliates of the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Health received their doctorates. Their paths and interests are different, and each honored her own unique path in remaining steadfast contributors to the vision of the Center.

Dr. Taylor Rogers was the inaugural student chair of UCLA’s partnership with the annual UNC minority health conference featured in a documentary short about the work of the center’s COVID Task Force on Racism & Equity, a collaboration with Charles R. Drew University of Medicine & Science. It highlights Dr. Rogers’ role writing press releases, identifying grant opportunities and generally supporting the advocacy work of one of the Center’s closest partners, the Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders. Since her arrival to UCLA, Dr. Rogers has fought to bring institutional change to the Fielding School of Public Health, UCLA and the field of Health Policy and Management. This has often been isolating, difficult work. We recognize your courage and salute you for your vision and persistence.

Dr. Nwankwo has been a dedicated grant writer and graduate student researcher at the Center since her arrival to the department of Community Health Sciences. She worked not only on behalf of the center, but also sometimes on behalf of our community partners. In addition to your eagerness to assist with center projects requiring support, you will be missed for your amazing humor, candor and team spirit, which you lavish upon us at every gathering large or small.

CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH OF YOU!!! WE ARE SO PROUD OF YOU. May your new academic homes recognize and celebrate the gift you are. May you feel like you belong. And, may the foundation you laid and the support you received enable you to thrive!

So much respect and pride.

In struggle for justice,

Chandra

From the Director...

From the Director:

Since joining the UCLA faculty in 2008, I have personally hosted a viewing of the UNC Minority Health Conference or sponsored a partnership conference at UCLA nearly every year. This practice continued through the Center, beginning in 2017 when the Center was launched. Student affiliate Taylor Rogers, a healthcrit and doctoral candidate in Health Policy & Management, agreed to serve as the inaugural student chair of the UCLA partner site for the conference. Since then, Millicent Robinson, Ale Cabral and Adrian Bacong have served in this role exceptionally.

This year, in lieu of a separate UCLA partner conference, we urge you to participate in one or both of the activities below, which both occur Friday, February 24, 2023. Participating is important not only to learn, but also to feel and to connect. Certainly, connecting with one another now—a period of continued violence and turbulence—is as important as ever.

“Practicing Health as a Human Right: Policy, Ethics and Law,” 44th Annual UNC Minority Health Conference

*which remains my favorite health equity-focused conference in the nation!*

For the conference schedule and to register, please visit the conference site.

“Transforming Research: Feminist Methods for Times of Crisis and Possibility,” 33rd Annual Thinking Gender Student Conference

Friday, February 24, 2023, at the Grand Horizon Ballroom at UCLA Covel Commons. For the conference schedule and to register, please visit the conference website.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend.

In struggle for health justice,

Chandra

From the Director...

From the Director

January 13, 2023

Happy new year and welcome to 2023! Certainly, 2022 turned out to be quite a tumultuous year socially, politically, globally, financially, climactically, and, for many people, personally; therefore, it may be tempting to want to put 2022 behind us altogether. But, like every year, 2022 also held promise at the beginning. My hope is not that we enter 2023 as an escape from the turmoil of 2022, but that we learn from 2022 in order to move through 2023 with both optimism and clear-eyed vision.

Some of you are new to the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health. The Center was launched five years ago on the inaugural Indigenous People’s Day in Los Angeles, October 9, 2017. It serves as a hub for researchers, students, staff and community members based at UCLA and elsewhere to collectively study and address the public health implications of various forms of racism. Founded based on the principles of Public Health Critical Race Praxis (PHCRP), Center affiliates are involved in rigorous research, innovative teaching and community engagement all focused on racial and social justice. You can find some of our publications and a video highlighting our activities during the COVID pandemic below:

• Racism: Science & Tools for the Public Health Professional – selected as an academic title for 2020 by the American Library Association

• Applying Critical Race Theory in Health Equity Research  – a special issue of Ethnicity & Disease

• The Rapid Assessment of COVID Evidence (RACE) Series - a special collection of papers currently being published in Ethnicity & Disease

• The COVID Task Force on Racism & Equity – video aired at the 2021 annual meeting of the American Public Health Association showcasing the work of the Task Force, which is a collaboration between UCLA and Charles R. Drew University of Medicine & Science

Last June, I introduced you to the Center’s first major cohort of PhD graduates, who had been deeply entrenched in antiracism scholarship, research, teaching and community engagement over the course of their doctoral programs. They represent a critical mass of emerging racism researchers. For instance, they constituted two-thirds of all doctorates earned in Community Health Sciences at UCLA in 2022. They have studied Critical Race Theory extensively, which is rare among public health programs. And, each of them is now completing postdoctoral fellowships, which will position them to shape the field through their research and future teaching. It will be exciting to see how collectively they will significantly bolster the capacity of public health to respond effectively to emergent threats to health equity.

The new year is a perfect time to introduce current student affiliates and their wide-ranging backgrounds and interests. So, I highlight just several of them here: Ale Cabral, Aisha Fletcher, James Huynh, Cindy Le, Erin Manalo, Ezinne Nwankwo, Dillon Rodriguez, and Taylor Rogers.

The most senior of these students--James, Ezinne and Taylor--are doctoral candidates, which means they have successfully defended their dissertation proposals and are now actively conducting the proposed dissertation research.

This group of eight students is poised to influence policy, which is essential for responding to health inequities. Aisha is a current Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholar (HPRS); James and Ezinne are recent alumni of the program. The program prepares students to become leaders advancing policy solutions to health inequities.

UCLA public health doctoral students complete a minor program of study while earning the doctorate. Cindy Le, who is a Robert and Melinda Gates Foundation Scholar, may be the first student whose minor is in information sciences. This will make her work extremely timely and relevant. Most importantly, it will provide her with the substance knowledge and skills needed not only to use emerging information science and data science technologies, but to create them and ensure they reflect core social justice principles.

Issues of immigration—its intersectionality with racism and other structural injustices—is a theme in the dissertation work and other activities of these students. Erin Manalo proudly draws on her identity in advancing anticolonial work that centers the people of the Philippines and recognizes salient gender dynamics. James Huynh’s focus on LGBT activism in Orange County, CA centers the experiences of the Vietnamese refugee communities there. Drawing on Queer and Trans of Color Critique as well as Public Health Critical Race Praxis (PHCRP) and traditional socio-behavioral theory, this work has the potential to inform future scholarship in queer studies, ethnic/area/American studies, and public health.

Ale Cabral has earned an impressive reputation for her selfless leadership roles in community-engaged research and community service. Her longstanding areas of interest include social determinants of HIV inequities, HIV and aging, substance use, and LGBTQ+ health. She coordinates the RACE Series being published in Ethnicity & Disease. It is remarkable that her grants portfolio as a doctoral student in Community Health Sciences exceeds that of some junior faculty.

Aisha and Dillon are the newest PhD students at the Center. Their broad areas of interest are tied to specific populations whose humanity continues to undervalued in society. Aisha is interested in improving the life expectancy and quality of life of African American men. Her interest in structural racism stems from the fact that so many of them die prematurely due to conditions that could have been prevented. Dillon’s work serves as a reminder that despite all of the pharmaceutical advances that have been made since the first cases of what is now known as AIDS were diagnosed, HIV continues to have a significant impact on the lives people of color, especially gay and bisexual men as well as transgender women. These populations experience the compounded impacts of intersecting factors tied to poverty and economic injustice, mass incarceration, homophobia and transphobia, nativism, limited access to care, stigma, mistrust of the public health sector, and racism. Through their work Aisha and Dillon seek not only to identify key determinants of the disparities, but also to center, value and show love for members of these populations.

To address the myriad of ways social injustices evolve over time, many Center affiliates are developing novel concepts and methods for research or interventions targeting racism. Among these students, for instance, Ezinne’s research is raising new questions about the need to understand differences, similarities and overlap between residential segregation imposed on recent immigrants of color vs their voluntary decisions to reside in ethnic enclaves.

Attention to healthcare is an increasingly important part of the nation’s public health agenda. Several of the students are focused on this in some way. Taylor has been working as an “outsider within” the field of health services research to identify institutional drivers of inequities in healthcare and document factors influencing the diversity of the workforce.

In addition to their research and scholarship, these students are actively engaged in service to the field and community. For instance, Ale co-designed and led an innovative, interactive online version of the annual Minority Health Conference at UCLA that incorporated yoga, mindfulness, exercise as well as an amazing soundtrack into a research conference program. Participants were so engaged that participation was still high at the end of the day-long event.

This is the final year of the center in its current format. You will have to stay tuned for the next phase of our work, which builds on all we have learned thus far in a new home and format.

If you have not had an opportunity to get involved yet, you do still have time to participate in the journal clubs, book club and formal presentations. As people who run track know, it is important to round the final bend of the race with a strong kick. We will continue to expand the movement for health justice through the remainder of the academic year by engaging with leaders of the next generation of public health centers on racism and health and by amplifying the work of the historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) with whom we most closely collaborate, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine & Science and Howard University. I do hope you’ll join us.

Thank you for supporting this work. Your support is invaluable. Looking forward to continuing the journey with you and with new partners.

In struggle for health equity,

Chandra

From the Director (regarding the strike)

From the Director:

The Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health stands in solidarity with UC students who are on strike for fairer wages. Like UC Berkeley, UCLA is located in one of the nation’s most prohibitively expensive cities in which to reside. Both the cost and availability of housing matter; even wealthy people looking for places to live in LA may have difficulty finding it. To live and work in Los Angeles requires reliable transportation, especially for people who cannot afford to live in Westwood, the neighborhood in which UCLA is located. The neighborhoods among which the campus is nestled are among the most expensive in the country and in Los Angeles: Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades, Culver City, Santa Monica, etc.  (See the Los Angeles City Historical Society’s online almanac). According to the LA Times’ Mapping LA Project, it is also one of the county’s whitest areas (Figure 1). It is remarkable—and not in a complimentary way--that only 7.0% of the population of Westwood is Latinx given Latinx people account for 48.9% of the population of Los Angeles and 40.2% of the state population according to the census.

Source: LA Times

Employment is one of the social determinants of health, which are known to create the conditions that drive health inequities. To address them is necessary to achieve the goal of public health: to promote optimal health for all.

All workers deserve fair and safe working conditions. The strike by student workers (e.g., research assistants, teaching assistants) and postdoctoral scholars, therefore, serves not only as a call to improve the working conditions for certain classes of workers, but as a reminder of the need to do so for all workers. This includes the university staff. Their contributions hold academic departments and the entire university together. Although they provide direct material and emotional support for students, faculty, administrators and others (e.g., patients), their needs, interests and perspectives are often overlooked, too.

Thank you, students and postdoctoral scholars, for reminding us that all workers deserve fair, safe working conditions and a living wage.

Let us see the student strike as an opportunity to learn more about the actual conditions of workers in the UC system and to work collectively toward creating optimal working conditions.

Resources that students and former students have shared with me are below.

A list provided by a UCLA student (name not disclosed intentionally here):

Read about the strike and workers' core demands

https://www.fairucnow.org

Join a picket line in California
https://www.fairucnow.org/picket/

Donate to the UAW-UC Academic Workers Strike Support and Hardship Fund
https://givebutter.com/uc-uaw

Review the UAW 2865 Bargaining Survey Results
https://uaw2865.org/2022-bargaining-campaign/bargaining-survey-results/

Host a teach-in about the strike
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1HTuvtm9TNj6NhbCFVM66enHYdVtS8ZoF/edit#slide=id.p1

Follow UAW Twitter (and Instagram) accounts for live updates
@uaw2865 @UAW5810 @sruuaw

In struggle for health equity,

 Chandra

From the Director on the Center's 5th Anniversary

From the Director…

Monday, October 10, 2022 marks the five-year anniversary of the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health (Center), which was launched on the inaugural Indigenous People’s Day in Los Angeles, October 9, 2017. I am deeply grateful for the warriors for health justice who have been leading our antiracism work through rigorous research, innovative teaching, community engagement, outreach and education as well as generous levels of service at UCLA, in the field of public health, in our local communities and beyond.

The founding core staff on graduation day, year 1. From left: Rebekah Israel Cross, Natalie J. Bradford, Chandra L. Ford, Porchia Toussaint

The level of impact on the field has exceeded my expectations. It was a privilege to publish Racism, Science & Tools for the Public Health Professional, and for it to be named a 2020 academic title by the American Library Association. I am particularly proud of the first large cohort of core doctoral students—Rebekah Israel Cross, Natalie J. Bradford, Anna Hing, Anna-Michelle McSorley, Millicent Robinson and Adrian Bacong—to graduate with their doctorates in June of this year. Each is conducting groundbreaking work rooted in very extensive work in racism, anti-racism, Public Health Critical Race Praxis, Critical Race Theory, anticolonialism, and health equity. They are already beginning to shape the national landscape of antiracism research, teaching and service in public health.

Book signing for Racism: Science & Tools for the Public Health Professional. American Public Health Association (APHA) Press Booth, APHA annual meeting 2019. From left to right: Derek Griffith, Keon Gilbert, Georges Benjamin (APHA Executive Director), Chandra Ford, Natalie Bradford, Marino Bruce.

One should not conflate having a center and with the effort entailed in building a center. For more than five years, we have been building a center. We have been fostering an institutional home for an expanding movement toward health justice. Many people have contributed to this work. I extend my deepest gratitude to everyone who has contributed in any way to its growth. THANK YOU. Your bold and innovative contributions as well as your practical ones have been helping to institutionalize anti-racism in the field of public health even before the field or the nation fully recognized the need for this work.

Graduation 2022 newly conferred PhDs: Rebekah Israel Cross, Adrian Bacong, Anna-Michelle McSorley, Anna Hing, Millicent Robinson. Not shown: Natalie J. Bradford

To agitate for justice within one’s own institution, profession or community can be isolating. To speak truth to power requires courage. So, I am particularly indebted to the core team of mostly BIPOC people with whom I have worked most closely over the last five years to forge an institutional home rooted in Public Health Critical Race Praxis (PHCRP). The particularly significant efforts of Rebekah Israel Cross, Natalie Bradford, Bita Amani, E. Minelle David, Ale Cabral, Consuela Abotsi-Kowu, Mienah Z. Sharif, James T. Huỳnh, Ezinne Nwankwo, Taylor Rogers, Kia Skrine Jeffers and Porchia Toussaint are immeasurable. I am extremely blessed to be able to draw on the wisdom of the Center’s Executive Board: Collins Airhihenbuwa, Keith Norris, Margaret Prescod, Barbara Krimgold, Camara Phyllis Jones, Gilbert Gee and Robin DG Kelley, Thank you for the opportunities and wisdom you have been sharing with me since before the Center was established. Finally, in addition to an extremely close relationship with the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, we are fortunate to have extraordinary community-based organizations with whom to partner. They include (but are not limited to) the Association of Black Women Physicians, Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders and Healthy African American Families. If you like the work of the Center, please support the work of our partners.

The Center is located in beautiful southern California on the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles. The United States secured California as its 30th state in 1850, two years after the Mexican American war ended with the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo; however, the original inhabitants and caretakers of this land were the Gabrieliño Tongva peoples. Though recognized as a nation more recently, the expansion of Los Angeles displaced this nation and helped facilitate the establishment of UCLA. However justice-oriented our work may be, the Center inherently benefits from the spoils of settler colonialism. We at the Center remain humbled and motivated by this knowledge. I am grateful to Rey Soto for steadfastly reminding us and our invited guests to remain attentive to this truth.

Equity has been defined in a variety of ways. Former president of the American Public Health Association, Camara Phyllis Jones,  defines it as “assurance of the conditions for optimal health for all people.”1 She further explains that health equity can only be achieved if we

• value all individuals and populations equally,

• recognize and rectifying historical injustices, and

• provide resources according to need.

This definition underscores that equity can only be achieved through the decolonization of public health. We will mark the 2022 Indigenous People’s Day in support of the UCLA Department of American Indian Studies and the American Indian Studies Center. We encourage everyone form learning circles to study your own indigenous communities.

This is a critical moment in the history of our nation, our communities and our world. And, there is much to do. I invite you to join us in whatever ways you can as we continue the struggle toward our dreams of a more just world in which there is optimal health for all. We are eager to lean into the next phase of our movement building work as we continue to:

lead the nation in conducting, rigorous community-engaged research to identify, investigate and explain how racism and other social inequalities influence the health of diverse local, national and global populations.

I extend my deepest gratitude to Center friends. Thank you. The past five years have been both rewarding and challenging.

Today we celebrate all that we have been able to achieve. Tomorrow, we return to the struggle.

For more information or to get involved, click here.

In struggle and with deepest gratitude,

Chandra

The Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health at UCLA acknowledges the Tongva peoples as the traditional land caretakers of Tovaangar (Los Angeles basin, So. Channel Islands) and are grateful to have the opportunity to work for the taraaxatom (indigenous peoples) in this place. As a land grant institution, we pay our respects to Honuukvetam (Ancestors), 'Ahiihirom (Elders), and 'eyoohiinkem (our relatives/relations) past, present and emerging.

References

1. Jones CP. Systems of Power, Axes of Inequity: Parallels, intersections, braiding the strands. Med Care. 2014;52:S71-S75.

2. Tuck E, Yang KW. Decolonization is not a metaphor. Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society. 2012;1(1):1-40.