Racial inequities in health have been documented and described in the public health literature for decades, yet these inequities have remained or even increased. In order to move forward, we must understand the role of cultural and structural racism upon which these inequities are built. Cultural racism shapes our society's structure and ultimately shapes the answers to the questions: "Whose life counts? Who is worthy of a healthy life?" In this presentation, Dr. Hicken will discuss the interwoven nature of both career trajectory, as a former PSC predoctoral trainee, and the development of her science on cultural and structural racism and health inequities. Specifically, she will outline her theory on racism and health and describe her collaborative data project designed to empirically examine this theory.

BIO:
Dr. Margaret Hicken is on faculty at the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan where she serves as director of the UM RacismLab, an interdisciplinary research collected designed to facilitate the career progression of scholar who study cultural and structural racism. She is also director of the Landscapes of Racism Dispossession and Control data project, supported with funding from NIDDK, NIMHD, and NIA, to examine the ways in which historical and contemporary forms of racial control have resulted in contemporary health inequities.

PSC Brown Bag seminars highlight recent research in population studies and serve as a focal point for building our research community.