Our Bodies, Our Future: Advancing Health and Human Rights for Women and Girls

In 2011, Our Bodies Ourselves celebrated our 40th anniversary with a new 9th edition of "Our Bodies, Ourselves" and an international women's health symposium that featured 12 of our global partners who have transformed the book into different formats and languages. The symposium, held on October 1, 2011, brought together women from Armenia, Bulgaria, India, Israel, Japan, Nepal, Nigeria, Puerto Rico, Senegal, Serbia, Tanzania, Turkey and the United States. They shared their extraordinary journeys transforming "Our Bodies, Ourselves" for their own countries and, along with the U.S. participants, discussed the successes, failures and challenges of the global women's health movement.

Videos of the symposium are now available online. Click on the individual links below, or go to the Our Bodies Ourselves YouTube channel to watch them all.

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More about the Symposium

• Read about the global groups that participated
• Read bios of the global speakers
• View the program guide

Click on the following to view:

Welcome & Greetings:

• Gov. Patrick Deval, Massachusetts Governor
  
  
• Robert Meenan, Dean of the Boston University School of Public Health
  
  
• Judy Norsigian and Zobeida Bonilla, OBOS executive director and OBOS Latina health initiative coordinator

Speakers:

• Byllye Avery, founder of the Avery Institute for Social Change and the National Black Women's Health Project, on the impact of Our Bodies Ourselves
  
  
• Adrienne Germain, president emerita of the International Women's Health Coalition, on the challenges and opportunities for our health and human rights
  
  
• Sam Morgan Lilienfeld and Judah Rome, sons of OBOS founders Pamela Morgan and Esther Rome, speak about growing up with feminist mothers
  
  
• Sally Whelan, program director for the OBOS Global Initiative, discusses the efforts involved working with groups around the world that are adapting "Our Bodies, Ourselves" for their own communities
  
  
• Ayesha Chatterjee, program manager for the OBOS Global Initiative, introduces the organization's global partners
  
  
• Loretta Ross, founder and national coordinator of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, delivers the closing keynote address
  

Panels:

• Around the Kitchen Table -- The Making of "Our Bodies, Ourselves"
  - Christine Cupaiuolo, Our Bodies Ourselves (USA)
  - Asia Kapande, Tanzania Home Economics Association (Tanzania)
  - Gamze Karadag, Mavi Kalem (Turkey)
  - Miho Ogino, Doshisha University Graduate School (Japan)
  
  
• Fire in the Belly - Meeting Challenges to Autonomy and Activism
  - Codou Bop, Groupe de Recherche sur les Femmes et les Lois au Senegal (Senegal)
  - Meri Khachikyan, "For Family and Health" Pan-Armenian Association (Armenia)
  - Renu Rajbhandari, Women's Rehabilitation Center (Nepal)
  - Nirvan Gonzalez Rosa, Latin American and Caribbean Women's Health Network (Puerto Rico)
  - Dana Weinberg, Women and Their Bodies (Israel)
  
  
• Building Power, Brokering Change
  - Dana Edell, SPARK and viBe Theater Experience (USA)
  - Raghda Elnabilsy, Women and Their Bodies (Israel)
  - Shamita Das Dasgupta, Sanlaap and Manavi (India and USA)
  - Stanislava Otasevic, Women's Health Promotion Center (Serbia)
  - Irina Todorova, Women's Health Initiative in Bulgaria

This event would not have been possible without the generous support of the Archibald Family Foundation, Boston University, Ford Foundation, Carolyn Mugar, and Partners HealthCare.