 | The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA |
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| The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA |
Alexandra Minna Stern, PhD, Center for the History of Medicine, University of Michigan, 100 Simpson Memorial Institute, 102 Observatory, 0725, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, 734-647-6914, amstern@umich.edu
From 1909 to the 1960s, over 20,000 inmates in California’s mental hospitals and institutions were sterilized in the name of protecting the public health from degenerate and anti-social offspring that would pollute the population and drain state resources. Despite this, and a recent apology from Governor Gray Davis for the state’s actions, we know relatively little about the broad social dynamics of eugenic sterilization, in relation to gender, ethnicity, citizenship status, class, and regional differentiation, in the 20th century. The purpose of this paper presentation is to provide an overview and analysis of this history, with a particular focus on Mexican immigrants and poor women. In addition to discussing the state's official policy, I will explore extra-legal operations performed in the 1970s, including a failed lawsuit filed by 10 Mexican American women against USC/Los Angeles County Hospital in 1976, and connect the passage of Proposition 187 in 1994 to the longevity of a eugenic logic of social prophylaxis and racial entitlement in modern California. I will conclude by raising several questions about the relationship between public health and eugenics, the danger of assuming the era of eugenics is safely behind us, and suggest that we need highlight the troubling history and enduring legacy of hereditarian ideas and practices in California.
Learning Objectives:
Keywords: Immigrants, Reproductive Health
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.