Participant Info

First Name
Alexandra
Last Name
Stern
Country
United States
State
MI Michigan
Affiliation
University of Michigan
Website URL
minnastern.com
Keywords
history of medicine; history of science; gender, sexuality, health; race and inequality; U.S.; Latin America
Availability
Media Contact
Additional Contact Information
PhD
PhD

Personal Info

Photo
About Me
Alexandra Minna Stern, Ph.D. is Chair and Professor of American Culture with appointments in History, Obstetrics and Gynecology and Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan. Her research focuses on the uses and misuses of genetics in the United States and Latin America. She is the author of the award-winning Eugenic Nation: Faults and Frontiers of Better Breeding in Modern America which was published in second edition by University of California Press in 2015. Her latest book, Telling Genes: The Story of Genetic Counseling in America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012) was a Choice 2013 Outstanding Academic Title in Health Sciences. She leads the Sterilization and Social Justice Lab, which studies qualitative and quantitative patterns of eugenic sterilization in twentieth-century California; this research is informing policy efforts to provide redress to survivors of compulsory sterilization. Stern has held numerous grants for her work in medical history and health policy, including from the National Endowment for the Humanities, National Institutes of Health, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. She regularly appears in the media for her pioneering interdisciplinary research on health and justice.
Recent Publications
Eugenic Nation: Faults and Frontiers of Better Breeding in Modern America (Berkeley: University of California Press,
2005; 2d. ed, 2015)
Telling Genes: The Story of Genetic Counseling in America
(Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012)
ARTICLES
“Disproportionate Sterilization of Latinos under California’s Eugenic Sterilization Program, 1920-1945,” with Novak,Nicole, Harlow, S., Kardia, S.,O’Connor, Kate, Lira, Natalie,American Journal of Public
Health,March 22,2018.
“Race, Health, and Discrimination:Historical and Contemporary Perspectives from Brazil and the United States,” with
Dóra Chor and Ricardo Ventura Santos,in
Cadernos da Saúde Publica 33 (2017).
“Shadows of Doubt: The Uneasy Incorporation of Iden
tification Science into Legal Determination of
Paternity in Brazil” with Sueann Caulfield, in
Cadernos da Saúde Publica/Public Health Reports
33:1 (2017).
Media Coverage
QUOTEDORCITED IN The New York Times|BBC |The Atlantic |NPR |HuffPost |Slate |San Francisco Chronicle|The LA Times|CNN|Vox|The American Prospect|TheWall Street Journal |Scientific American |Michigan Daily |The Sacramento Bee|Washington Post |Rewire
Country Focus
Expertise by Geography
Latin America, United States
Expertise by Chronology
20th century, 21st century
Expertise by Topic
Gender, Genocide, Medicine, Migration & Immigration, Race, Science, Sexuality, Sexual Violence