Medicine and Ethics in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction

Esther L. Jones is an Assistant Professor of English at Clark University, USA.

"This is a work that invites all to 'eat salt together,' to understand the historical and sociopolitical complexities of black female difference that have affected and infected the national body politic. Jones's prescription is clear and fresh: black women's speculative fiction offers alternate epistemologies and methodologies for good physical and spiritual health." - Valerie Lee, Professor of English, The Ohio State University, USA "Esther L. Jones shows how works of speculative fiction by Octavia Butler, Nnedi Okorafor, and Nalo Hopkinson offer theoretical insight into the misuses of medical science in authorizing social classifications such as race and gender by turning them into ostensibly biological categories. These works remind us to pay attention to how the invaluable insights of science can at the same time reinforce social hierarchies and, in so doing, offer potent challenges as they underscore the power of narrative to effect social transformation. Jones makes a compelling argument for the powerful contributions not only of speculative fiction, but of literary works generally to a cultural analysis that helps to move us toward more just and equitable social relations." - Priscilla Wald, Professor of English and Women's Studies, Duke University, USA

• Introduction: Eating Salt: Black Women's Health and the Politics of Difference in Medicine 1. The Black Girl's Burden: Eugenics, Genomics, and Genocide in Octavia Butler's Fledgling 2. The Unbearable Burden of Culture: Sexual Violence, Women's Power, and Cultural Ethics in Nnedi Okorafor's Who Fears Death 3. Organ Donation, Mythic Medicine, and Madness in Nalo Hopkinson's Brown Girl in the Ring 4. "I Mean to Survive": Feminist Disability Theory and Womanist Survival Ethics in Octavia Butler's Parables Conclusion: Blood, Salt, and Tears: Theorizing Difference in the Black Feminist Speculative Tradition