FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | JANUARY 8, 2024
Ms. magazine announced Monday the launch of their third podcast under the Ms. Studios banner: United Bodies with Kendall Ciesemier.
United Bodies is a podcast about the lived experience of health. Join health and disability writer, producer, and activist Kendall Ciesemier and her guests as they explore how different components of our health—mental, physical, social, and spiritual—interplay with one another and intersect with the whole of our identity. When we understand these forces in our lives, we can meet both ourselves and others with more empathy and maybe even realize our fights for equality, justice, freedom, and accessibility are united. United Bodies is a podcast of Ms. Studios.
The series launches Monday, Jan. 8, with episodes airing weekly. Full guest list includes: Imani Barbarin, Fariha Roísin, Brittany Packnett Cunningham, Krista Cezair, Samantha Reid, Wanda Irving, Samantha Irby, Morgan Dixon, Aj Williams, Stephanie Foo, Phillip Picardi, adrienne maree brown and Andrea Gibson.
Head to msmagazine.com/series/united-bodies/ for full episodes, transcripts, further reading and ways to take action.
“If you’re fat, if you’re disabled, if you’re Black, it never ends – the commentary, the conversations. And so you really never grow up as a disabled person, particularly as a disabled Black person, feeling like your body is not under some consideration at all times.” —Imani Barbarin
“One third to one half of all of the people who are killed by police every year are people with disabilities. I think we have to understand that we come from a culture that has historically terrorized people who have shown any sign of mental illness or mental health distress. I mean thankfully, we’re not in the era anymore where there was widespread torture being seen as medical attention…And yet, even though we’re not performing some of those same barbaric actions, that doesn’t mean that the mentality behind those actions has disappeared from culture, because if we see people as monstrous, or threatening or not human, then it is much easier to excuse the way that we ignore people or the poor ways in which we treat them.” —Brittany Packnett Cunningham
“[The wellness craze in America is] a continuation of controlling death, and controlling the narrative around sickness and illness, and equating that to weakness as opposed to understanding that bodies are just bodies and humans are just humans. And everyone has bought into capitalism so much that they really think that that’s the antidote.” —Fariha Roísin
Meet Kendall Ciesemier: Kendall Ciesemier is a writer and producer based in Brooklyn. She is the host of “United Bodies,” a podcast about the lived experience of health for Ms. Magazine. Kendall is also the Senior Executive Producer of Multimedia at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Host of the ACLU Podcast, “At Liberty.” She is also a sought-after health and disability advocate and writer with work in The New York Times and CNN.
Her opinion journalism has driven real world impact: from securing clemency from then President Trump for Alice Marie Johnson to prompting both the Biden and Trump administrations to make notable changes to the organ transplant distribution system, including breaking up the national organ monopoly. Most prominently Kendall has appeared on The Oprah Show with President Clinton, the TODAY Show, and CBS Mornings. She was named the 2014 Glamour Magazine College Woman of the Year, a Chicagoan of the Year by Chicago Magazine, a Zeitgeist Young Mind by Google, and one of Youth Service America’s “Top 25 Most Powerful and Influential Young People,” among other distinctions.
About Ms. Magazine: Co-founded by Gloria Steinem in 1972 and published by the Feminist Majority Foundation since 2001, Ms. magazine has been a trusted, popular source for feminist news and information in print and online for nearly 50 years. Ms.’s time-honored traditions of an emphasis on in-depth investigative reporting and feminist political analysis have never been more relevant, bringing a new generation of writers and readers together to share news, analysis, research and strategies for fighting back and moving forward, for shaping the future.
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If you would like more information on United Bodies, or to schedule an interview with Kendall Ciesemier, please email press@msmagazine.com.
