Why Pregnant People Are Choosing Birth Centers for Delivery

After months of preparing to give birth to her first child at a birthing center, T’Nika’s plans had to change: She needed a caesarean section due go her baby’s placement during delivery. As a Black woman giving birth during COVID-19, giving birth outside of a traditional hospital sounded appealing. But her baby had other plans, and due to the birthing center’s working relationship with a nearby hospital, T’Nika was quickly transferred.

Why don’t we see women as “electable”?

As coverage of the 2022 midterms continues, NBC News Capitol Hill Correspondent Ali Vitali is ready to see more women running for office and watch how candidates are going to address women’s issues, including childcare and access to abortion. During the 2020 election cycle, Vitali was on the campaign trail covering candidates like Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar. It seemed like a remarkable year, one in which a woman finally had a chance to be elected as the president of the United Sta

Wellness is for All if We Get Rid of Capitalism and Ableism

We urgently need your help. DAME reports the stories that need to be told, from perspectives that aren’t heard enough. In times of crisis it is even more critical that these voices are not overlooked, but COVID-19 has impacted our ability to keep publishing. Please support our mission by joining today to help us keep reporting. Growing up, many of us are taught that being sick is a sign that we’re not taking care of ourselves. This is just one of many erroneous messages about wellness that chro

Marissa Miller Says Being Weird Is Good

JWA sat down with writer Marissa Miller to discuss her essay collection Pretty Weird: Overcoming Impostor Syndrome and Other Oddly Empowering Lessons, published in May 2021. Miller’s debut book highlights the awkwardness of growing up, the difficulty of managing a freelance writing career, the importance of Jewish culture, and the struggle of living with disordered eating. From depicting a living situation gone wrong to experimentation with sexuality at Jewish summer camp, the book is full of pe

The 10 best books to understand the climate crisis, according to experts

• Educating yourself about climate change can help you evaluate your relationship with the planet. • We talked to climate scientists Elizabeth M. Cook and Logan Brenner for their book recommendations. • These books cover climate activism as well as how cities, food, and fashion impact global warming. Reading news about how we have less than a decade to try and prevent irreversible, devastating climate change can be daunting, especially if we want to find ways to limit our carbon footprint or g

What the Sterilization of a Wealthy White Woman Reveals About Eugenics

Throughout history, white women have thrown the rights of other women under the bus in order to retain social status. In her first book, The Unfit Heiress: The Tragic Life and Scandalous Sterilization of Ann Cooper Hewitt (out today from Grand Central Publishing), Audrey Clare Farley writes about the life of one such woman: Ann Cooper Hewitt, a wealthy white socialite and the daughter of inventor Peter Cooper Hewitt and his wife, Maryon.

The Royal Spy Who Became the Feminist Answer to Shakespeare

In 1695, theater audiences in Britain were riveted by the debut of a tale about two star-crossed lovers. After a bloody two-year war, Prince Oroonoko went to pay his respects to Imoinda, the daughter of a general who had died during the war. He brought slaves with him as a gift for the deceased general’s daughter, “trophies of her father’s victories.” Upon meeting the charming and beautiful Imoinda, Prince Oroonoko promptly fell in love. The two were engaged to be married, until Oroonoko’s grandfather, the King of Coromantee — in modern-day Ghana — became smitten with Imoinda as well. The elderly king, who already had many wives, moved Imoinda into his harem and decreed that she was to marry him.

How One Writer Overcame a Brain Injury and Wrote an Award-Winning Memoir

In July, New York Times bestselling author Andrea J. Buchanan published the article “The Maid Who Mapped the Heavens” at Narratively, which tells the story of Williminia Paton Flemming, a maid who became a groundbreaking astronomer. This was not Buchanan’s first foray into literary science writing. Her memoir The Beginning of Everything: How I Lost My Mind and Found Myself is a 2019 PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award finalist. Like Flemming, Buchanan had to overcome obstacles, in her case while recovering from a brain injury. We chatted with Buchanan about her recovery, her approach to memoir writing, and what’s in store for her in the future.

This Editor’s First Book is a Home Run

Michael Stahl, Narratively’s layout manager, contributing editor, and longtime writer, loves baseball. At Narratively, Michael has written about the embattled New York Mets’ star Kevin Mitchell and American black baseball players who left for Canada to play the sport. Now his work continues with a new book, Big Sexy: In His Own Words, out May 12. The book is the All-Star pitcher Bartolo Colón’s autobiography, which Colón co-authored with Michael Stahl. Michael chatted with us about how he landed such a coveted book deal, and how the Narratively crew, “taking a chance on someone that had no experience” years ago, helped set him up for the success he has today.

A New Book Explores the Lost Jewish Communities of the South

In her second book, Wandering Dixie: Dispatches from the Lost Jewish South, writer Sue Eisenfeld takes the reader on a journey while she travels to and researches lost Jewish communities. Lost communities in Eisenfeld’s book include places where it seems like the only part of Jewish history that remains are old temples, as well as cities where people may be surprised that Jewish communities thrive. Wandering Dixie is not a history book, but rather a memoir where Eisenfeld’s connections to the su

How This Contributor Turned His Investigative Reporting Into a Novel

Over the past seven years, we have been fortunate to build up an international network of storytellers who bring deeply reported tales from around the globe to Narratively. One of these writers is Joe Henley, a three-time contributor originally from Canada, now based in Taiwan. Henley’s work covers a wide range of topics – just at Narratively this year he wrote both The Expat English Teachers’ Murderous Love Triangle and The 11-Year-Old Girl Taking Skateboarding By Storm. But one issue that he has been drawn to time and again is the mistreatment of migrant workers in Taiwan. We chatted with Henley about his upcoming book Migrante, the conditions that migrant workers in Taiwan face, and his advice on how to pursue fiction writing.