Professor Charlene Galarneau Talks Women's Health in "30 Issues in 30 Days" Series

Boston's WGBH Radio is exploring what's "really at stake" this election season with a six-week series highlighting "30 Issues in 30 Days." The series, according to the WGBH website, is aimed at "cutting through the confusion and chatter of Election 2012."

Wellesley's Charlene Galarneau, assistant professor of women’s and gender studies, spoke with WGBH reporter Anne Mostue '03 last week for a discussion on women's health and abortion.

Galarneau, giving a historical perspective, told WGBH that the talk about women's health this election season, as in years past, "has tended to focus on women as reproductive beings.” Reproductive health, she said, is very important but "it is not all that women are."

"I think it’s important that we have started to broaden the conversation to think about women’s health in other ways,” Galareneau said. You can listen to the entire conversation "Why You Should Care About ... Women's Health and Abortion" on the WGBH website.

Galarneau's research focuses on health and health care, both public and global along with the ethics and policy thereof, and feminist and religiously-based approaches to justice. She teaches courses in feminist bioethics, gender justice and health policy, women and health, global health, and U.S. public health.  She has been honored with Wellesley’s Anna and Samuel Pinanski Prize for Excellence in Teaching and is a Faculty Fellow with Wellesley’s Madeleine Korbel Albright Institute for Global Affairs.

An October 1 WGBH listener poll ranked "Women's Health/Abortion" as the most important issue presented in the first week of the series. Would you like to know more about the where the candidates stand? A separate page on the WGBH website outlines Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, Elizabeth Warren, and Scott Brown's positions.