Racialized Health, COVID-19, and Religious Responses: Black Atlantic Contexts and Perspectives

R. Drew Smith · Stephanie C. Boddie · Bertis D. English

Mar 2022 · Routledge

About this ebook

Racialized Health, COVID-19, and Religious Responses: Black Atlantic Contexts and Perspectives explores black religious responses to black health concerns amidst persistent race-based health disparities and healthcare inequities. This cutting-edge edited volume provides theoretically and descriptively rich analysis of cases and contexts where race factors strongly in black health outcomes and dynamics, viewing these matters from various disciplinary and national vantage points. The volume is divided into the following four parts:

• Systemic and Socio-Cultural Dimensions of Black Health
• Ecclesial Responses to Black Health Vulnerabilities
• Public Education and Policy Considerations
• Spirituality and the Wellness of Black Minds, Bodies and Souls

Part I explores ways social and cultural factors such as racial bias, religious conviction, and resource capacity have influenced and delimited black health prospects. Part II looks historically and contemporarily at denominational and ecumenical responses to collective black health emergencies in places such as Nigeria, the UK, the US, and the Caribbean. Part III focuses on public advocacy, particularly collective black health, both in terms of policy and education. The final section deals with spiritual, psychological, and theological dimensions, understandings, and pursuits of black health and wholeness.

Collectively, the essays in the volume delineate analysis and action that wrestle with the multidimensional nature of black wellness and with ways broad public resources and black religious resources should be mobilized and leveraged to ensure collective black wellness.

"The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license."

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About the author

R. Drew Smith, PhD, is a political scientist who serves as professor of Urban Ministry and director of the Metro-Urban Institute at the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. He is a founding co-convener of the Transatlantic Roundtable on Religion and Race, a global network of scholars, religious leaders, and activists. His publications on religion and public life include more than eighty articles, chapters, and essays, nine edited books, and four themed academic journal issues. He also holds an appointment as Professor Extraordinarious at the Institute for Gender Studies at the University of South Africa.

Stephanie C. Boddie, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Diana R. Garland School of Social Work, the George W. Truett Theological Seminary, and the School of Education at Baylor University where she co-teaches Disrupting Racial Disparities in Health Care. She also is a co-convener of the Transatlantic Roundtable on Religion and Race, a professor extraordinarius in the Institute for Gender Studies at University of South Africa, a faculty associate at the Center for Social Development at Washington University and a fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Program for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society. She is coauthor of more than sixty journal articles, chapters, and reports, and of several books and short films.

Bertis D. English, PhD, is a professor of history at Alabama State University in Montgomery. He is owner of English Editing Services, LLC; author of the book Civil Wars, Civil Beings in Civil Rights in Alabama’s Black Belt: A History of Perry County; and editor of the International Journal of Africana Studies. His scholarly writings appear in state, regional, national, and global publications.