Women, Race, Recovery: How Some of History’s Most Impactful Thinkers Reflect on Their Own Healing

Abstract

With examples from influential women of color feminists, the essay points to some obstacles in the way to developing a true practice of recovery for women of color academics whose research brings them in continual contact with histories and enactments of harm against women and people of color. As women of color in higher education, articulating our health and healing needs in our own terms would help us clear a path to promoting ourselves as whole and healthy persons, in addition to promoting us along a career path. The essay collects reflections on health struggles from famous women of color feminists, to note trends in how their lived experiences of physical and emotional health challenges blend with their intellectual and activist work on behalf of women and people of color