Karina Walters – Transcending Historical Trauma

Throughout history, settler colonialism has endeavored to erase the lived experiences and histories of American Indian and Alaska Native Peoples. Yet, Indigenous populations, particularly Indigenous women, remain strong and resilient pillars of communities. Oftentimes these [her]stories are missed in public health initiatives as a result of settler colonialism’s perpetual drive to erase and silence. In this talk, Dr. Walters will explore the latest advances in designing culturally derived, Indigenist health promotion interventions among American Indian and Alaska Native women.

Alberto Ortiz-Díaz – Carceral Care: Health Professionals and the Living Dead in Colonial Puerto Rico’s Sanitary City, 1920s-1940s

On November 2, 2022, Prof. Albert Ortiz-Díaz delivered a talk that explored the early history of the Río Piedras sanitary city or medical corridor, a transnationally and imperially inspired built environment and complex of welfare institutions (a tuberculosis hospital, an insane asylum, and a penitentiary) constructed and consolidated on the margins of San Juan.

Tahir Amin – Intellectual Property Wars: The Battle for Access to Medicines

On Oct. 18, 2022, Tahir Amin delivered the inaugural Sawyer Seminar talk on “Intellectual Property Wars: The Battle for Access to Medicines” at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in Downtown Santa Cruz. Amin, LL.B., Dip. LP., is a founder and executive director of the Initiative for Medicines, Access & Knowledge (I-MAK), a nonprofit organization working to address structural inequities in how medicines are developed and distributed.