Join Barbara Ellen Smith, Lesley-Marie Buer, and Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson as they discus single health issues such as black lung, overdose deaths, HIV and hepatitis C, COVID-19, in Appalachia and what they reveal about the cracks in America's health and health care systems in general.
————————————————————
Most responses to these single issues have done little to change the overall systems, but there are initiatives and groups that offer glimpses of what change could look like. They will explore topics such as mutual aid, researcher/clinician/community member coalitions, harm reduction, street medics and how they can be applied in Appalachia and beyond.
Lesly-Marie Buer is an activist and public health practitioner at Positively Living/Choice Health Network in Knoxville, Tennessee. Her work on substance use and harm reduction has appeared insuch publications as Boston Review, the Journal of Appalachian Studies, and North American Dialogue.
Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson is a 33 year old, Affrilachian (Black Appalachian), working class woman, born and raised in Southeast Tennessee. She is the Co-Executive Director of the Highlander Research & Education Center in New Market, TN. She has served as president of the Black Affairs Association at East Tennessee State University and the Rho Upsilon Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. She is a long-time activist working around issues of mountaintop removal mining, and environmental racism in central and southern Appalachia, and has served on the National Council of the Student Environmental Action Coalition. She is an active participant in the Movement for Black Lives and is on the governance council of the Southern Movement Assembly.
Barbara Ellen Smith has participated in and written about movements for social justice in Appalachia and the U.S. South for more than forty years. She is professor emerita at Virginia Tech
————————————————————
To order a copy of Rx Appalachia: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1496-rx-appalachia
To pre-order a copy of Digging Our Own Graves: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781642592757
For more info on the Highlander Research & Education Center: https://www.highlandercenter.org/
————————————————————
Haymarket Books is an independent, radical, non-profit publisher. All money we take in goes directly to support our project of sharing ideas for changing the world—a project has never been more necessary or more urgent. We need your help to continue to do the work.
While all of our events are freely available, we ask that those who are able make a solidarity donation in support of our continuing to do this important work.
————————————————————
Follow us to help support our work!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and like this video
Twitter: @haymarketbooks
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/haymarketbooks
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/haymarketbooks/
