mana.org/mana2008/speakers.htm -
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Published on: 1/1/2008
Last Visited: 9/26/2008
Katherine Prown , PhD, has 15 years of experience in community organizing, activism and teaching.A consultant, press liaison and advocate for organizations working on legislation to license Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs), Katherine is a founding member of the National Birth Policy Coalition and the Campaign Manager of The Big Push for Midwives 2008.As Legislative Chair for the Wisconsin Guild of Midwives, Katherine drafted legislation to license Certified Professional Midwives in Wisconsin and co-lead a statewide, bi-partisan grassroots advocacy campaign to successfully pass the bill into law in 2006.In support of that effort, she founded Wisconsin Birth Options, a statewide grassroots network devoted to maternity care reform in Wisconsin, and in 2006 she received the Citizens for Midwifery Susan F. Hodges Award for Outstanding Leadership in Midwifery Advocacy.Katherine also founded and continues to moderate a number of national e-lists focused on maternity care reform in other states, which have a combined membership of more than 1,000 individuals.In addition, she serves as a consultant to national and state midwifery and consumer organizations working on a range of maternity care issues, from increasing access to midwives to decreasing the rate of cesarean sections.In support of these efforts, Katherine has successfully organized and launched public relations campaigns and large-scale rallies in Richmond, VA, Washington, D.C., Chicago and Pittsburgh, which have drawn local and national media attention to the issues surrounding the legal status of midwives in the United States.In her capacity as the Advocacy Director of the International Cesarean Awareness Network, Katherine researched and developed a white paper on the legal status of the rights of women seeking vaginal births after cesarean (VBAC) called Protecting and Enforcing the Rights of Women Seeking Vaginal Birth after Cesarean: A Primer . She was also a contributing author to From Calling to Courtroom: A Survival Guide for Midwives , and she works with Conscious Woman, Inc. to provide continuing education workshops for midwives, attorneys and other professionals on the legal issues surrounding VBAC bans and on midwifery law.
Arisika Razak, MPH, CNM, has been a midwife, healer and spiritual dancer for over thirty years.For over twenty years she provided midwifery care in northern California, serving as a home and hospital birth attendant, patient care advocate, hospital administrator and health educator.She served as Program Director of the Integrative Health Studies Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies from 2003-2008; she is currently the Program Chair of the Women's Spirituality Program there.Arisika has led spiritual and healing workshops for women for over two decades; she is a contributor to several books, and presents at numerous conferences on the subjects of multiculturalism and diversity, women's health and healing, and embodied spirituality and movement.Her film credits include interviews in the PBS health special "Who Lives, Who Dies?"and the first feature length film by an African woman on Female Genital Cutting.
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