RESEARCH INVOLVING BLACK CANADIAN PERINATAL EXPERIENCES

Graduate studies build on experience as a maternal healthcare practitioner, centering health + racial inequity, sexual violence, and 2SLGBTQI+ experiences.

Recent peer-reviewed publication:   

Melaku, H., Flynn, K., Wilson-Mitchell, K., & McPherson, E. (2025). Unearthing Mother-Midwives: Black Women's Hidden Legacy in Canadian Maternal Care. Canadian Journal of Health History, 42(2), 254–294. 

'Mother–midwife' (coined term): Black birthing people who utilized traditional midwifery knowledge to care for themselves and their children during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum in a self-directed manner, enabling survival.  

Central question: Based on the paucity of sources, what do we know about Black women's maternal experiences and midwifery skill sets? These practices reveal deep harm met by deeper resistance, care, and survival—from colonial times through the early 1900s.

This historical analysis directly informs current PhD research: 

PhD Candidate, York University
Birthing While Black in Canada: Disability at the Confluence of Racism and Obstetric Violence

As a birth companion and IBCLC with 20+ years supporting Black families, the question became: What do Black perinatal testimonies reveal about how healthcare becomes disabling?

When we treat testimony as evidence (not exception), patterns emerge: disbelief, delay, coercion — the institutional choreography that disables bodies, relationships, family life.

This builds directly on practice — birthing people with chronic pain they can't shake, partners burned out from compensating, babies with feeding challenges. The Birthing While Black Survey captures this family-wide reality.

Three contributions:

• Critical Disability Studies meets Black perinatal care
• Original data beyond mortality stats
• Predictable harm patterns, not random events

Master's Research -Master in Environmental Studies (MES)
Explored Black maternal experiences during COVID-19 through #BirthingWhileBlack in Canada:

• Documentary film: Birthing While Black During COVID-19 (Black mothers + birth workers)
• Manuscript: "Unpacking emergency response: anti-Black racism and asylum claimants in Quebec"
• Framework: First Food Sovereignty — policy tool for infant feeding justice
• Art: blueprint Series installation

Key finding: Black families birth in survival mode, acutely aware of anti-Black violence in healthcare.