Opening of the Exhibition “We Are Not Alone”: Legacies of Eugenics at Harvard Countway Library

Date and Time

May 18, 2023

1:00 pm - 1:50 pm

Location

Join the FXB Center for Health & Human Rights, the Center for the History of Medicine at Harvard Countway Library, the Centre for Medical Humanities at Oxford Brookes University, the Harvard Faculty of Arts & Sciences Committee on Ethnicity, Migration, Rights, and the Harvard Department of the History of Science for a discussion and Q&A session on the history of eugenics to mark the opening of the exhibition “We Are Not Alone”: Legacies of Eugenics at Harvard Countway Library’s Minot Room on Thursday, May 18 at 1:00pm – 1:50pm EDT.

Engaging with, and contributing to, a global anti-eugenic movement of reckoning with the past, the exhibition “We Are Not Alone”: Legacies of Eugenics reveals the shifting and fluid meanings that characterised ideas of human betterment in different national and international contexts. It offers a historically informed account of our eugenic past, present, and future, balancing various elements of continuity and discontinuity, of idiosyncrasy and similarity. Continued education about and engagement with eugenics, as well as its public condemnation, are essential components of our efforts to understand a hidden and tenebrous past, while at the same time, continuing work towards a fair and just society. The exhibition was part of the FXB Roma Program‘s 11th annual Roma Conference in April 2023 and will be on view at Countway Library on L2 through September 2023 following this event.

This is a free, in-person event but registration is required. Light refreshments will be served and the exhibition will be on view in the same space as the panel discussion.

Agenda

1:00pm | Welcoming remarks:

Natalia Linos, MSc, ScD

Dr. Natalia Linos is a social epidemiologist and the Executive Director of the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard. She has over 15 years of experience working at the global and local levels on some of the most pressing public health challenges of our time: from climate change to systemic racism.

1:05pm – 1:25pm | Panel Discussion:

Speakers:

Marius Turda, PhD

Marius Turda is Professor of Biomedicine and Director of the Centre for Medical Humanities at Oxford Brookes University, having previously taught at UCL and the University of Oxford. He is the founding director of the Cantemir Institute at the University of Oxford (2012-13) and founder of the Working Group in the History of Race and Eugenics (2006). In 2020, he established Romania’s first Centre for the History of Eugenics and Racism at the Institute of History ‘G. Baritiu‘ in Cluj. He has authored, co-authored and edited more than 25 books on the history of eugenics, race, and racism in East-Central Europe and beyond. Between 2018 and 2022, he also curated four exhibitions on eugenics, racial anthropology and biopolitics. He was one of the main consultants for the acclaimed BBC documentary ‘Eugenics: Science’s Greatest Scandal’ (2019). His most recent public engagement project is www.confront-eugenics.org.

Evelynn Hammonds, PhD

Professor Hammonds is the Barbara Gutmann Rosenkrantz Professor of the History of Science and Professor of African and African American Studies in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard University. Professor Hammonds’ areas of research include the histories of science, medicine and public health in the United States; race, gender and sexuality in science studies; feminist theory and African American history.  She has published articles on the history of disease, race and science, African American feminism, African-American women and the epidemic of HIV/AIDS; analyses of gender and race in science, medicine and public health and the history of health disparities in the U.S.

Nancy Krieger, PhD

Nancy Krieger is Professor of Social Epidemiology and American Cancer Society Clinical Research Professor, in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (HSPH) and Director of the HSPH Interdisciplinary Concentration on Women, Gender, and Health. She received her PhD in Epidemiology from the University of California at Berkeley in 1989. Dr. Krieger is an internationally recognized social epidemiologist, with a background in biochemistry, philosophy of science, and the history of public health, combined with over 35 years of activism linking issues involving social justice, science, and health.

Gracyelle Costa Ferreira, PhD

Gracyelle Costa Ferreira is a professor in the Social Work Department at the Universidade Federal Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. She is currently a visiting scholar at the Afro-Latin American Research Institute at Harvard University. She is writing a manuscript about “Eugenics and Social Welfare Policy in Brazil during the early 20th Century” as part of her research and scholarship at Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo. In 2021, she received the “Prêmio Capes Tese” Award for the best doctoral dissertation in Brazil in her field.

1:25pm – 1:40pm | Q&A Session

The “We Are Not Alone”: Legacies of Eugenics exhibition on view at the Joseph B. Martin Conference Center during the 11th annual Roma Conference on April 6, 2023. Photos by Kent Dayton/Harvard Chan School:

Opening of the Exhibition "We Are Not Alone": Legacies of Eugenics at Harvard Countway Library

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