“Black and brown people are overlooked when it comes to abortion,” Renee Bracey Sherman told Ms. “We’re left out of history as if we simply weren’t there … which is really sad to be honest, and it’s also not accurate.”
Renee Bracey Sherman and Regina Mahone recently released their co-authored book, Liberating Abortion: Claiming Our History, Sharing Our Stories, and Building the Reproductive Future We Deserve. In it, they offer a new perspective on the history of abortion and imagine a future where reproductive justice is realized.
Liberating Abortion is the first book on the history of abortion written by two Black women who experienced abortion. With the goal of writing Black and brown people back into the history and future of abortion, the book features over 50 interviews with people of color who have had abortions.
Sherman and Mahone ask us to build a better future that begins with building community around abortion and reproductive freedom now.
Ms. sat down with Renee Bracey Sherman to discuss her new book, Liberating Abortion, the history of abortion and where we go from here.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Mariah Lindsay: Can you tell me about the inspiration or motivation behind developing and writing this book?
Renee Bracey Sherman: I have been doing abortion activism, abortion storytelling work for 15 years, which is how I met Regina—she was my editor when she was at Rewire. We were at a little camp thing one summer, and we sat in this boat. We had this long conversation about what our views on abortion are, particularly as two Black women who had abortions. Talking about what did we feel like was like missing and also, I had recently been approached by a different agent, not the agent we went with, about writing a book. And so, she was like, ‘Oh, do you want to write a book?’ And I was like, ‘I don’t know, maybe.’
We decided a little bit about it, and we talked about, sort of what we saw was missing in the canon of books about abortion and what we wanted. She wanted to really write something from a parenting perspective, Black maternal health. I was really interested in Black and brown people being written back into history. So we started ideating on what this could look like, which obviously became Liberating Abortion, but it was really about the way in which the experiences of Black and brown people are overlooked when it comes to abortion. We’re left out of history as if we simply weren’t there, or it’s like a couple of little anecdotes throughout history, which is really sad to be honest, and it’s also not accurate.
It’s really the story of how Black and brown people have been liberating abortion for 6,500 years.
Renee Bracey Sherman, co-author of Liberating Abortion
We were like, what would it look like to tell the full real story of abortion, retell the story centering people of color who have been left out of the history or purposefully ignored or forgotten about, and really bring that to the forefront and think about when we reexamine our history, what does that say about what this moment is and who’s doing the work that needs to then propel us forward to finally liberate abortion for all. It’s really the story of how Black and brown people have been liberating abortion for 6,500 years. But also, what do we need to do to keep moving forward and build the world that we want to see?
Lindsay: That’s beautiful, and it’s a tremendous amount of work and contributions that this book brings. I’m thinking about the story of Sakinah [Ahad Shannon], who was one of the Black Jane volunteers, and I wanted to open it up for you to speak about that, or other unique contributions that Liberating Abortion is bringing to this conversation about abortion and its history.
Sherman: Yes. So that started out when Regina and I were doing research, and reading The Story of Jane [by Laura Kaplan]. Of course, as abortion activists, we’ve all heard of Jane but we were really frustrated, because we felt like it was always posited as it was these white women in Chicago, but there had to be at least one person color, there had to be one Black girl. When we read Laura Kaplan’s book, there were two written in there. We were like, this doesn’t make sense that the story is being told where it’s the white Janes providing the abortions, and Black and brown women have abortions. We were like, how do we find them? And we will literally write in the text, but we always knew they existed, even if we didn’t know that they existed.
And so we started doing some searching. I had been in touch with Emma [Pildes] and Tia [Lessin], who did The Janes, the HBO documentary. They had asked me if I knew any women of color who had abortions through Jane, and I didn’t. And so, it started like that little digging, and then finally, with the documentary, they connected us to Marie Leaner first, who has this fascinating story of being in Chicago and working with young parents, teen parents, and a little bit with the Panthers, and really just doing Black liberation work in the 1960s and 70s, and it was really fascinating. Then we finally met with Laura Kaplan, who wrote The Story of Jane, the original book. And then she sort of vetted me, and then was like, I do know the other Black woman. I’m still friends with her, and I’ll let you know if I recommend. We talked on the phone a couple times and met for lunch. And then Laura finally was like, I’ll tell Saki that she can talk to you.
I met up with Sakinah in Chicago a few months later, and it was just this amazing experience, because she is just such a regal Black woman. She was dressed to the nines. She came in in pearls, and I have a photo of us. We met in this little cafe and I’m interviewing her, and she has so many stories, and just the wealth of stories that she has. Regina and I just felt so honored that we could document their contributions to history in this book, because they are in their 80s and we are losing folks, ancestors who did this work. And so it was just really beautiful. And she tells some stories that still to this day make me cry.
I did an event on Thursday night, and there was a lot of older women in the room. So I read a little bit from the Jane chapter, and I read about ho Sakinah did the counseling for people who were having an abortion through Jane at her home. One day she was followed into her home by this woman, she came into the lobby of the apartment building, and she was like, Jane? Saki kind of looks at her and her daughter perks up. And this woman’s like, do I know you? And Sakinah is like, I don’t think so. I don’t know. And then the woman is like, I think you helped me. I just don’t remember which apartment you live in. And Sakinah is like, okay. She feels a little bit of like, okay, clearly this woman knows some things. So she’s says, oh I’m on the 10th floor, and the woman’s like, okay, and then she left. She said, every week that woman put money under her door to pay back the $100 that she borrowed for her abortion. And she says to Sakinah, I owe you. I owe Jane.
Sakinah says those were the type of women that we were working with, and that’s why she never felt scared to do this work. That to me, that was the community building, and that was the power of being able to interview her and hear these stories, and being able to bring that to: This is the community that we have built to make sure that all of us get the abortion care that we need, and also that’s what we’re going to need going forward. So I just loved being able to talk to them and being able to then, you know, the way in which Regina and I wrote it in the book to really try and drop the reader into that moment was huge.
Lindsay: That is so beautiful. I have full-blown chills.
Sherman: I had to read it the other day, and I was crying, and we wrote into the text, ‘Yes, we were crying at this part too.’ Because, all I do is cry every time I hear that, think about that or reread that part, because it’s just so beautiful, and it also shows the level of trust that complete strangers had to put in one another at that time. And you have to do now.
Lindsay: I think that we miss so much in talking about the numbers at the national level. I think that these interviews that you have created the book around provide this really important context of what does this look like on the ground? And I was wondering, we have this beautiful story about Sakinah and the amazing work she did. Even post Roe v. Wade, she knew that this work needed to continue. And I wanted to know, what are some other takeaways from these interviews? What can we learn from these 50 interviews with people of color who have had abortions?
Sherman: I think that there’s so much focus on heroes of the past, as if they’re extraordinary people doing extraordinary things. And in some cases, that is true, but in most cases, they’re just ordinary people trying to make the world a better place and make abortion a little easier for the next people who come along. So, when Regina and I wrote the book, we were very intentional about the language that we were using, making sure that we filled it with stories and narrative and joy and in a practical, accessible way of writing. So that feels like we’re just having a conversation with you and bringing you up to speed on how we got here and what’s happening, and also what’s next. So that way you can join in and find a place that fits for you.
I think it’s just really important and beautiful that we show up for one another in that way, and that we remind ourselves that history and change is not always made by people doing superhuman things.
Sherman
I think sticking with the story of Jane, Marie did what she could, which was open up her home to people and offer comfort. She never provided abortion. Saki also opened up her home, and then went deeper with counseling, and then ended up running several abortion clinics afterwards. We all do what feels right and best for us. And I think it’s just really important and beautiful that we show up for one another in that way, and that we remind ourselves that history and change is not always made by people doing superhuman things. It’s about the way in which we change the culture and the communities that we live in every single day. And our hope is that people will read this and then say, ‘Oh, here’s how I can do that.’
Lindsay: That’s such a beautiful message. I think that we forget the people of the past, like you were saying, are humans, too and that we are totally capable of doing this. And it can be as small as—and it’s not small, that’s not what I’m saying—but it can be as easy as opening your home to somebody and offering that space. I think that’s so beautiful.
Sherman: It doesn’t all have to look like jumping into the movement and dedicating your whole life to working nonprofit or being at every single rally all the time. It’s not. It’s figuring out how you pace yourself and what is the change that you can make? And sometimes that change is raising really wonderful human children all around you. And I think that is great. And I think that people overlook that too.
Lindsay: The content of Liberating Abortion feels especially topical given the current political climate we’re in and the legal landscape around abortion. I was wondering how you think the book might help frame this political moment and maybe even the upcoming election.
Sherman: I think my hope, or our hope, is that people will see this moment and recognize in reading the book that we’ve been here before, and that to finally get off this hamster wheel we need to have big shifts, big changes and an actual investment in people, and that half measures are never going to get us to where we want to go. That it is not enough for politicians to say, ‘I want to restore Roe,’ because Roe sucked.
Like, yes, it made the legal protections, and that’s not nothing. That is huge and important, but it left so many people out, and we are seeing the remnants of this crumbling system and how all of these things are interconnected. It’s not just abortion, it’s not just pregnancy, it’s not just policing, it’s not just housing, it’s not just racial justice, it’s not just any of these things. They’re all so connected and intertwined, and our opposition is all the same. So we need to actually understand how they’re connected and move forward. I think right now, although there are politicians who are finally talking about it in an intersectional way, they’re still talking about it as if one law or one measure will change something, instead of actually looking at the way in which White supremacy, colonialism and capitalism is actually destroying us.
You cannot say that you care about reproductive freedom and then also, at the same time, the money that we need to make sure that we have hospitals, and universal childcare, and universal health care, and abortion access and all of these things are being used to bomb and burn people alive. You can’t do these both. I can’t continue to look at Instagram posts of International Daughter’s Day and people being like we’ll stand up for women and girls everywhere. Meanwhile, I scroll down another post, and I’m watching little girls and women starving and being burned alive with the tax dollars that I gave the government. I said, “Here, can you please build us a better world?”
You cannot say that you care about reproductive freedom and then also, at the same time, the money that we need to make sure that we have hospitals, and universal childcare, and universal health care, and abortion access and all of these things are being used to bomb and burn people alive.
Sherman
And so I think that it can’t just be cute little talking points and rhetoric alone. The question is how are we actually building a world? And that starts with demilitarism, decolonialism, defunding the police, all of those things. That’s the through line of our stories, that we will never be able to liberate abortion so long as these things exist because they’ve actually been the impediment to abortion for hundreds of years. And you guys can keep ignoring it all you want. That’s fine, but don’t expect any different fucking change.
We do not govern based on what our opposition is saying. We govern based on the world that we want to create and what’s been interesting is, as I’m doing this tour for the book, people are really surprised. It’s so funny. They’re like, you talk about abortion and reproductive freedom in such a joyful way, given everything, and I’m like, I do, don’t I? One of the questions is why? It was cute, it was so funny. And I was like, because I can’t do anything else, I’m so tired. I’ve been doing this for 15 years. … I need to dream, because when the world is finally ready to restore abortion access, they have to have some ideas, and somebody has to keep pushing forward. And if we keep only focusing on what the people who hate us are doing, we’re never going to get anywhere.
Toni Morrison was like racism is a distraction and I think that it’s both very real—obviously, racism is—but she points out that it is a distraction, so that you will sit there and continue to prove that you are worthy, so that they can continue going on and destroying things, because you are just so focused with being like, we are smart, we are this, we are that, and proving yourself, and they can just lie, and I feel like it’s the same thing with abortion. We are constantly trying to prove that abortion is a moral decision, abortion is safe, abortion should be legal, all these things and where we don’t spend time, then thinking about, what do we actually want abortion to look like for people?
That’s why we’re asking them to dream and bringing in the ideas of people who’ve already had abortions, and it’s like, I mean it’s such a fucking long chapter. It really wasn’t supposed to be super long, but the “What to Expect When You’re Expecting an Abortion” [chapter is] so long because actually, there’s a lot in which you can think about for your abortion experience, and how you show up, and how you ask people to show up for you.
I mean, it’s 30 fucking pages, and it could be as simple as find a clinic, do this, do that, right? But we wanted to really bring in the advice of other people because we really wanted them to be heard and we want you to recognize that you don’t have to just accept whatever is given to you, you get to also make a huge investment and change in yourself. I want people to think about like, we don’t need to wait for a law. We actually can just build the communities that we want and the productive future we deserve and liberate abortion ourselves.
Wherever you live, there is someone who cannot access an abortion in your community.
Sherman
Lindsay: I completely agree. Constantly being on the defensive is not productive for anybody, and it’s not going to give us what we need in the end, because that’s what we’ve been doing for the last, I don’t know how long has it been since 1973? We didn’t keep imagining a more better future, and then we got beat back even further. I’m with you 100 percent.
I was wondering, on that high note, as you were talking about your joy in doing this work, it’s so necessary because it can be so depressing. So it’s, I think, a fundamental piece of your book: What do we need to do to liberate abortion, one and for all?
Sherman: I mean, that’s what’s hard is it’s not one thing, right? I think that we all need to start with learning our history and understanding how we got here, and what is the history that they’re trying to keep us from learning and understanding? So that’s one piece.
I think the other piece is really thinking about, what can you do in your community to make a difference? Actually just look around you. You don’t have to look very far to this, oh, how can I fix this over there? Wherever you live, there is someone who cannot access an abortion in your community. Whether, because the infrastructure is making it really difficult for them to travel, whether they can’t afford it, or because they are feeling like someone is making them feel bad for having an abortion. So there’s always someone in your community or your family who is having a hard time accessing abortion.
So I think it’s really important that people learn some of the history, get that abortion misinformation out of your brain. Learn how to spot it and reject it, and understand how and why they’re trying to get [you to think] a certain way. Then also assess your own stigma and how you might be breathing it in and perpetuating it in the world. And how you breathe in that racism and then, when combined with reproductive injustice, it’s harming people.
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