A Crash Course in Feminist Environmental Health!

 A New Podcast!

Learn with us through case studies of products marketed to women and girls including cleaning products, cosmetics/personal care, menstrual/intimate care products and more. We discuss the health effects of toxic chemicals in these products and hear from feminist scientists and activists who are designing creative solutions by raising awareness, advocating for policy reform, and community organizing for action!

What Our Listeners are Saying

  • It’s really important information for people to have, and it’s just so important to me to know that you and others are doing that work! It gives me hope.

  • I really appreciated your discussion of the contributions of second wave feminism to this fight while also noticing where it’s fallen short, and where things stand currently.

  • I have listened to your latest podcast twice and it is terrific!! I love your interdisciplinary approach and inclusion of so many voices.

  • I loved the interweaving of the racial, ethnic and feminist history of domestic work, the contemporary context of the pandemic, the geographical, biological and political analysis of the chemicals involved . . . . I learned so much as I thought about all these issues while listening to these voices.

  • Eye opening interviews with workers and the hazards to which they are exposed, including systemic racism and toxic cleaning products. Organizations devoted to making visible the nature of the work and their importance in the fight for safer cleaning products and better working conditions overall.

  • I listened to the first episode a few days ago and really enjoyed it! I had no idea that douching had been touted as a form of birth control, and it just makes the pivot in marketing after the pill came out make so much sense/extremely enraging.

Header photo courtesy of Women’s Voices for the Earth

Latest Episode

EPISODE 4

: The Beast in Beauty: Toxic Chemicals in Hair Straighteners

Many hair care products marketed particularly to Black women and girls contain chemicals that are endocrine disruptors and thus may interfere with the body’s hormone system. Some of these chemicals are also known to cause asthma or cancer. In this episode, we explore the chemical and cultural issues around Black hair care and interview scientists and activists who are working to ensure that safer products are available.