The Healing Power of Black Women's Words: In Honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Williams, Erica L., Spelman College

2021-10-08

2020-2029

I first got diagnosed with breast cancer in January 2021. My first reaction was, of course, crying and talking with my family. My next reaction was turning to read familiar and comforting words: Audre Lorde�s The Cancer Journals (1980). There was something about reading the words of another Black woman who had gone through the journey on which I was about to embark that bolstered me. Audre Lorde opens the book by identifying herself as a post-mastectomy woman who believes our feelings need voice in order to be recognized, respected, and of use (9). I, too, am a �post-mastectomy woman. But it was quite a whirlwind to get to that point.

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Cite Black Women (blog)

Anthropology Department

Spelman College

http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12322/sc.fac.pubs:2022_williams_erica_l

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/