An old photograph of a round black woman with head covering and a long skirt sits on a small wooden bench, hand on her knee, nursing a white baby of about 6 months - 1 year. The baby kneads the breast with their hand. A drop of milk leaks from the opposite breast.
A pen drawing of a Black woman in traditional African dress with a head wrap and shawl, breastfeeding a white baby. She looks odd to the side and is smiling slightly.
An old photograph of a Black woman with a white head wrap tandem sitting in a chair nursing a black baby and a white baby. She is looking down at them. The caption at the bottom reads “Southern Hospitality.”
An old photograph of a Black woman in a white bonnet and black and white dress, sitting on a chair holding a young white newborn, with a white toddler with short blonde hair and light colored eyes standing next to her with his hand on her knee. Both children are dressed in white. The woman and the toddler look toward the camera but a little off to the side.
This #Juneteenth, the lactation world honors the enslaved women whose milk was stolen from their babies and given to white babies.
This legacy lives on today in health disparities such as #FirstFoodDeserts. In her book Reproductive Injustice, Dána-Ain Davis calls this the “afterlife of slavery.”