Amá Film Screening Resources: Resources

Book List for Indigenous Peoples’ Day

Sally J. Torpy; Native American Women and Coerced Sterilization: On the Trail of Tears in the 1970s. American Indian Culture and Research Journal 1 January 2000; 24 (2): 1–22. doi: https://doi.org/10.17953/aicr.24.2.7646013460646042

We hope this reaches everyone safe and doing as well as possible under the circumstances. While most news around California prison issues is rightly focused on the Covid-19 outbreak, one piece of positive news is the continued movement of AB 3052 – Compensation for Survivors of Forced or Involuntary Sterilization Act – through the California Assembly. This bill would establish the Forced or Involuntary Sterilization Compensation Program for the purpose of providing victim compensation to survivors of state-sponsored sterilization conducted pursuant to eugenics laws that existed in California between 1909 and 1979 and to survivors of coerced sterilizations of people in prisons. Sterilization has long been used in the US as a genocidal tactic against third world women, their families and communities.

​The Sterilization and Social Justice Lab is an interdisciplinary research team studying the history of sterilization in the United States. Our multi-institutional team includes historians, epidemiologists, and digital humanists. We explore patterns and experiences of eugenics and sterilization in the 20th century using mixed methods from the social sciences, humanities, and public health. Initially focused on California, our project now includes Iowa, Michigan, and North Carolina. We connect this history to reproductive, disability, and racial justice, as we reflect on the relevance of the past to social justice today.