Deirdre Cooper Owens

Associate Professor of Africana Studies and History

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Ph.D., UCLA

 

Areas of Specialty

History of Medicine; Slavery; 19th Century U.S. History; African American History; & Women’s History

 

Biography

Deirdre Cooper Owens believes she was born to be a historian. Born to Gullah/Geechee parents from South Carolina’s Low Country, she was raised around folks who told oral histories of their family members, historical events, and shared oral histories of the enslaved. Her mother is the family’s genealogist and her father worked at the National Archives for over 30 years. Her background in both SC and Washington, DC nurtured her love of the past.

Today, Cooper Owens is a popular public speaker, writer, and reproductive justice advocate. She has published both scholarly and popular pieces on issues that concern African American historical experiences. She is an Organization of American Historians’ (OAH) Distinguished Lecturer, a past American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Fellow and has won several prestigious honors and awards for her scholarly and advocacy work in history and reproductive and birthing justice. She is also proud of the service she provides to institutions dedicated to dismantling the current Black birthing crisis. Her first book, Medical Bondage: Race, Gender and the Origins of American Gynecology garnered a Darlene Clark Hine Prize from the Organization of American Historians as the best book written on Black women’s history and gender history. She is currently working on a popular biography of Harriet Tubman that examines the revolutionary through the lens of disability and a monograph about the history of race, medical discovery, and the C-section.

She is jointly appointed faculty in the Department of History.

 

PUBLICATIONS

“Harriet Tubman’s Disability and Why it Matters,” Ms. Magazine (2022)

“Black Maternal and Infant Health: Historical Legacies of Slavery” by Deirdre Cooper Owens and Sharla Fett, American Journal of Public Health (2019)

Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and The Origins of American Gynecology (UGA Press, 2017)

 

INVITED TALKS AND CONFERENCE PAPERS

Keynote Speaker, III Oporto Biomedical Summit, Porto, Portugal

Keynote Speaker, Exploring the Contours of Wellness and Health, Sorbonne University

Keynote Speaker, Law, Difference, and Healthcare Conference, Princeton University

Keynote Speaker, Stephanie Camp Memorial Lecture, University of Washington

Keynote Speaker, Crown Forum, Morehouse College

 

HONORS AND AWARDS

National Institute of Health High Priority, Short-Term Project Award (R56), “Reduce health disparities in Black women,” $4288, November 2022

Agnes Dillon Randolph Award, University of Virginia, School of Nursing’s Eleanor Crowder Bjoring Center for Nursing Historical Inquiry, $500, March 2022

Society of Early Americanist Historians, Scholar of the Month, October 2021

Winner of the 2018 Darlene Clark Hine Book Prize for the best book on African American women’s history or gender history, Organization of American Historians

Contributor to Understanding and Teaching American Slavery (University of WI Press, 2016), 2019 James Robinson Prize for the most outstanding contribution to the teaching and learning of history in any field, American Historical Association