Research Context
Brazil has an intensely pluralist society in which ethnic distinctions typically overlap with structural inequalities.
The need to create a healthcare system that protects Indigenous women’s decision- making power and respects ethnic, cultural, and religious differences is a matter of urgent concern.
Data suggests a greater vulnerability of indigenous women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights.
- Teenage pregnancy: Between 2008- 2019, almost 30% of babies born to Indigenous women had mothers aged 10-19.
- Unintended pregnancy and abortion: Higher rates in indigenous population, and Indigenous women face greater risks of abortion related complications.
- Birth and mortality rates: 5% of Xukuru and Pankararu women give birth inside their Indigenous territories and 26% had C-sections. Indigenous women have 2-4 higher mortality rates.
- Diseases: Indigenous women present a disproportionately high incidence of STD/HIV/AIDS and cervical cancer.
Main objective
To work with Indigenous women from the Pankararu and Xukuru peoples to consolidate reproductive justice by improving access to sexual and reproductive healthcare in a manner that respects their worldviews and cultural practices.
Theoretical framework
The project combines insights from, and makes an important contribution to, a wide range of literatures, including sexual and reproductive rights, (Indigenous) feminist legal studies, indigenous rights and legal pluralism, health law, sociology of health, sociology of professions, anthropology, and health studies.
The project complements existing analyses by generating empirical data concerning the Indigenous conceptions of sexual and reproductive health/illness, SRR, and RJ amongst indigenous women.
It also re-examines questions concerning the limits of protection of Indigenous practices in a pluralist legal system.
Research questions
As a result of exchanges with indigenous women from the Northeast of Brazil, three main Research Questions have been identified. Each of these questions will be addressed in a separate Work Package (WP):
Research Question 1 (WP1):
What are the constructions of sexual and reproductive health/ illness of the Indigenous communities in the northeast of Brazil?
Research Question 2 (WP2):
How well does Brazilian health law (and regulation) reflect the Indigenous conceptions of sexual and reproductive health and to what extent do healthcare systems facilitate or impede Indigenous women’s access to sexual and reproductive rights?
Research Question 3 (WP3):
What role do healthcare professionals and traditional healers play in the construction of reproductive justice, and how are traditional worldviews and healing practices integrated?
Research methods
The project adopts a community-based participatory research methodology.
Indigenous women will participate in all stages of the research process, defining the needs and priorities of their communities and co-producing the research agenda in accordance with their unique knowledge systems. This will be achieved through the organisation of events involving community leaders and activists and the continuous consultation with the communities, conducted by the indigenous researchers involved in the project.
Within this methodology, the project adopts a multi-method approach utilising theoretical analysis, doctrinal legal analysis, and qualitative research methods, including interviews and participant observation.
