Interview with Loretta Ross

Abstract

Loretta Ross is an activist on women’s issues including reproductive justice, human rights, and opposition to hate groups and right wing organizations. In the 1970s, Ross was one of the first African American women to direct a rape crisis center. In the 1980s, she served as director Women of Color Programs for the National Organization for Women, organizing the first national conference on women of color and reproductive rights in 1987. She successfully organized women of color delegations for the massive pro-choice marches NOW sponsored in 1986 and 1989, and in 2004, she was national co-director of the March for Women’s Lives in Washington, DC, the largest protest march in U.S. history with more than one million participants. From 1990 to 1995, Loretta served as National Program Research Director for the Atlanta-based Center for Democratic Renewal. She directed projects on far right organizations in South Africa, the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi involvement and anti-abortion violence in the U.S. Following this, she founded the National Center for Human Rights Education, a training and resources center for grassroots activists. She is co-author of the book Undivided Rights: Women of Color Organizing for Reproductive Justice. Ross is currently writing a book on reproductive rights entitled Black Abortion. A graduate of Howard University, in 2003, Ross received an honorary Doctorate of Civil Law from Arcadia University. Loretta is a founding member of and current national coordinator of SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective, a network of over 70 women of color allied organizations that work on reproductive health issues.