wocinsolidarity:

African American women have a long history with doulas, particularly during the Jim Crow era when hospitals denied access to black women, forcing many to deliver their children at home, said Andrea Williams-Salaam, a doula trainer in the Baltimore program. But as race-based legal barriers vanished and the medical profession strongly promoted hospital deliveries as the safest option, fewer women practiced as doulas.

[…]

It was the idea of empowering other women that induced Keyona Hough to become one of the five doula trainees in Baltimore.

Too often, poor African American women are treated disrespectfully by the institutions they interact with, she said. She wants not only to advocate for her clients but also to “teach them how to advocate for themselves.”

“Like me, a lot of these moms have been subjected to violence and trauma,” she said. “That’s why I want to help them understand what their rights are, so they can move through that system without being re-traumatized.”