Environmental Repro

1. [Ava Springsteel] Hello! Welcome to “Environmental Repro”, a podcast where we discuss the intersection of Reproductive and Environmental Justice.  
2. [AS] Before we discuss these topics, I want to take a moment to define them. In ReproductiveJustice: An Introduction, by Loretta Ross and Rickie Solinger, they define the three central pillars of reproductive justice as (1) the right to not have a child, (2) the right to have a child, and (3) the right to parent the children in a safe and healthy environment.¹ Environmental Justice is defined by the United States Environmental Protection Agency as “the just treatment and meaningful involvement of all people, regardless of [any identity]in agency decision-making and other Federal activities that affect human health and the environment so that people:
   1. are fully protected from disproportionate and adverse human health and environmental effects (including risks) and hazards, including those related to climate change, the cumulative impacts of environmental and other burdens, and the legacy of racism or other structural or systemic barriers; and
   2. have equitable access to a healthy, sustainable, and resilient environment in which to live, play, work, learn, grow, worship, and engage in cultural and subsistence practices”²
3. Together, these two concepts work to empower through personal and bodily autonomy, as well as having autonomy in one’s environment and creating action within it. 
4. Katsi Cook, a leader in women’s reproductive health and environmental activism leads with the pillar that “Women are the first environment” in all of her work. This idea, and all of Cook’s work, is grounded in indigenous knowledge and community.³
5. Cook grew up in The Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne, located in Northern New York straddling the US-Canadian border, and along the St. Lawrence River. The river continues to be an important source of resources at Akwesasne.⁴ 
6. She attended Skidmore College and Dartmouth College, then became involved in the American Indian Movement (AIM). She became interested in traditional birthing methods and midwifery, and she moved back to Akwesasne.⁵
7. Through her work with women in the community, and through her own observation, Cook started to suspect that something was happening to the environment around Akwesasne. As a midwife, she was very tuned in to specifically the reproductive health of her community. 
8. She knew about a dump site from General Motors, who had a facility very close to Akwesasne. There was some research happening before the founding of the MMP by Mt. Sinai, and eventually, General Motors found PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, in one of their wells and closed it.⁶ After a dream, Cook decided to pay closer attention to what was going on with the river and the studies that were happening about it. 
9. There was frustration with Mt. Sinai’s resistance to report back the findings they found, and Cook started to see gaps in the research. 
10. [Katsi Cook] “And so, from all that experience and all of that research and reading and going to meetings and taking the time to get involved, I began to see huge gaps in the research process itself and in the tissue-sample collection. And I looked at all the literature I could find on breast milk contamination and began to understand that the story wasn’t complete and that here were the opportunities, in terms of time frame, that if we were going to be doing PCB research, that it had better include Mohawk mothers’ milk. And so, I put together the sketch of a proposal addressed to the St. Regis Mohawk Health Services and to the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne’s Health Department, that finally, the health services were supporting breastfeeding, that the numbers of breastfeeding mothers was going up, after generations of being told, You’ve got to use bottle, feed your baby formula. And yet, we really didn’t know the quality of the mothers’ milk — not that I wanted to throw a wet blanket on increasing breastfeeding, right, because that’s something I wanted to see as a midwife, that’s something I’m working towards, but is that the proper — that is not informed choice, if you don’t have that data.”⁷
11. [AS] With that, the Mothers’ Milk Project was founded in 1983.⁸ 
12. In partnership with a private lab, they studied levels of PCBs and other chemicals in the breast milk. They did find elevated levels of PCB and other chemicals, such as Mirex, a flame retardant and Hexachlorobenzene, an agricultural fungicide.⁹ With this finding, they eliminated local fish from their diet. Eating fish from the river was a culturally significant practice, and this highlights just how much the pollution from the companies was affecting the Akwesasne way of life.
13. The process in which the research and findings were conducted was crucial for the empowerment and claiming of autonomy by the mothers and the community:
14. [KC]“And so at the very outset, I demanded that the only way we’re going to work with Mohawk women in the precious intimacy of Mohawk mothers’ milk and our relationship to our young is to ensure the mothers that they are co-investigators in this study. There’s not going to be any one of you researchers that stand taller than the Mohawk mothers. We’re all of the same height, which is a traditional principle in our longhouse. That we’re not going to be guinea pigs. You’re not going to run back to your funding agency with our analyses before you tell us. Those are our tissues. That’s our data. It doesn’t belong to your funding agency first. We want control over how this happens.”¹⁰ 
15. [AS] After the initial research was conducted, there were interviews and feedback recorded by the women whose breast milk was tested. In the document “Mohawk Women Respond”, in the Smith College Special Collections, they express a variety of emotions and reflections on the PCB contamination, their experience, and their challenges. They were surprised there were not higher amounts of PCB contamination in their breast milk. They felt suspicious that this finding would result in the companies responsible for the contamination to resist taking responsibility. They recognize the anger, helplessness, and hopelessness they feel, and emphasize community and the hard work it will take to make change and keep going.¹¹
16. The Mothers’ Milk Project made crucial strides in community action, Native womens’ empowerment, and environmental-focused reproductive justice. They brought their findings to international conferences and brought attention to this important issue, because the things learned go beyond one community. Cook says, 
17. [KC]“This is society’s challenge, not just the Mohawk community challenge. And it belongs in women’s work, like everything else in human experience. We need women’s leadership to deal with all of this.”¹²
18. [AS] The lessons learned through the Mothers’ Milk Project are critical when looking forward to organizing, educating, and empowering around reproductive environmental justice. 
19. I encourage you to listen to the entirety of Katsi Cook’s oral history, located in the Smith College Archives, explore her current work.
20. Thank you for listening!

1. Ross, Loretta, and Rickie Solinger. 2017. Reproductive Justice: An Introduction. N.p.: University of California Press. ↩︎
2. “Environmental Justice”, United States Environmental Protection Agency, accessed November 26, 2024, https://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice ↩︎
3. “Women Are the First Environment: Interview with Mohawk elder Katsi Cook”, Braided Way, 
   November 3, 2018, https://braidedway.org/women-are-the-first-environment-interview-with-mohawk-elder-katsi-cook/. ↩︎
4. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, October 27, 2005, Voices of Feminism Oral History Project, Sophia Smith Collection, pp. 2. ↩︎
5. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording. ↩︎
6. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, pp. 81. ↩︎
7. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, pp. 83-84. ↩︎
8. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording. ↩︎
9. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, pp. 85. ↩︎
10. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, pp. 87. ↩︎
11. Workshop, 1992, smith_ssc_ms00528_as129082_001. Sophia Smith Collection of Women’s History, Accessed November 26, 2024. ↩︎
12. Katsi Cook, interview by Joyce Follet, transcript of video recording, pp. 90. ↩︎

References

Cook, Katsi. Interview by Joyce Follet. Video recording, October 26 and 27, 2005. Voices of 

Feminism Oral History Project, Sophia Smith Collection.

Cook, Katsi. Interview by Joyce Follet. Transcript of video recording, October 26 and 27, 2005. 

Voices of Feminism Oral History Project, Sophia Smith Collection.

“Environmental Justice”, United States Environmental Protection Agency, accessed November 

26, 2024, https://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice

Millie Knap, Katsi Cook, 1992, photograph, 8 X 10 Inches, Katsi Cook Papers, Sophia Smith 

Collection, Smith College, Northampton, Mass. 

Ross, Loretta, and Rickie Solinger. 2017. Reproductive Justice: An Introduction. N.p.: University of California Press.

Silliman, Jael M. 2004. Undivided Rights: Women of Color Organize for Reproductive Justice. Edited by Jael M. Silliman. N.p.: South End Press.

“Women Are the First Environment: Interview with Mohawk elder Katsi Cook”, Braided Way, 

November 3, 2018, https://braidedway.org/women-are-the-first-environment-interview 

-with-mohawk-elder-katsi-cook/.

Workshop, 1992, smith_ssc_ms00528_as129082_001. Sophia Smith Collection of Women’s 

History, Accessed November 26, 2024.