Health Rights at the Crossroads

This special issue of Western Humanities Review is themed “Health Rights at the Crossroads: Women, New Science, and Institutional Violence.” The editors say, “Together these articles [in the magazine] exemplify the vital conversation in the medical humanities and social sciences that is emerging at the intersection of women’s rights, emerging technologies of science and health, and institutional violence. This conversation and the articles in this issue raise critical questions about the meanings of power and empowerment for women engaged in practices such as wage labor via assisted reproductive technologies and sex, and the political and economic struggles over the circumstances within which they will engage in these labors and have access to health services such as abortion.”

The issue features writers Leslie Butt, Kelly Ray Knight, Rachel Niehuus, Sharmila Rudrappa, Carolyn Sufrin, and Tracy Weitz and was guest edited by Galen Joseph and Dorothy Porter.