“In Patient Bettina Judd beautifully (and horrifically) draws on historical
evidence of nineteenth-century medical experimentation on black women,
scholarly explorations of the body and the archive, and personal medical
history. The result is haunting in its insistence on laying bare these stories as
they not only articulate experiences of the past but also resonate deeply with
black women’s experiences with the U.S. medical complex in the present.
Patient is a brilliant meditation on race, gender, and science and a thrilling
anthem to black women’s self-knowledge.”
—Elsa Barkley Brown, University of Maryland
The reading and lecture will focus on Bettina Judd’s collection of poems
titled Patient, which won the Black Lawrence Press Hudson Book Prize and was
released in November of 2014. Patient includes poems examining the work of J.
Marion Sims, 19th century physician who operated on black women and who is
memorialized on the South Carolina State House Grounds.
Judd will also be reading during the Deckle Edge Literary Festival in Columbia,
February 19-21.
Born in Baltimore and raised in Southern California, Bettina Judd is an
interdisciplinary writer, artist and performer. She is an alumna of Spelman
College and the University of Maryland and is currently Visiting Assistant
Professor of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies at the College of William
and Mary.
6:30pm
2016/02/23 - 2016/02/23
Petigru 111
Greene Street between Pickens and Bull St, Columbia, SC 29201