Mar 1st 2018

This fascinating political look at a little-known chapter in women’s history tells the story of “Jane,” the Chicago-based women’s health group who performed nearly 12,000 safe illegal abortions between 1969 and 1973 with no formal medical training. As Jane members describe finding feminism and clients describe finding Jane, archival footage and recreations mingle to depict how the repression of the early sixties and social movements of the late sixties influenced this unique group. Both vital knowledge and meditation on the process of empowerment, Jane: An Abortion Service showcases the importance of preserving women’s knowledge in the face of revisionist history.

(Kate Kirtz & Nell Lundy, USA, 1996, 58 min., digital video)

Following the film is a panel discussion featuring Jenna Prochaska, staff attorney of the ACLU’s Women’s and Reproductive Rights Project; Leah Greenblum, director of the Midwest Access Coalition; Tiffany Pryor, executive director of Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health; Kristin Schilt, associate professor and director of the University of Chicago’s Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality; Sarah Valliere, clinical training alumna of the Midwest Access Project; and Jennifer Wild, associate professor in the Department of Cinema & Media Studies and the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality at the University of Chicago.

Co-sponsored by the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality.

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