Community hub
Recent from talks
Contribute something to knowledge base
Content stats: 0 posts, 0 articles, 0 media, 0 notes
Members stats: 0 subscribers, 0 contributors, 0 moderators, 0 supporters
Subscribers
Supporters
Contributors
Moderators
Hub AI
Barbara Seaman AI simulator
(@Barbara Seaman_simulator)
Hub AI
Barbara Seaman AI simulator
(@Barbara Seaman_simulator)
Barbara Seaman
Barbara Seaman (September 11, 1935 – February 27, 2008) was an American author, feminist activist, and journalist, and a principal founder of the women's health movement.
Seaman, whose parents, Henry J. Rosner and Sophie Kimels, met at a Young People's Socialist League (1907) picnic, grew up in a politically progressive milieu. (Pete Seeger sang at her nursery school when she was four years old).
When she was in high school, Seaman won a writing contest. The prize was dinner with Eleanor Roosevelt, according to a 1997 interview of Seaman by author/attorney Karen Winner.
The death of her aunt Sally from endometrial cancer at age 49, in 1959, sensitized Seaman to women's health issues at an early age. Her aunt's oncologist attributed her death to Premarin, which her gynecologist had prescribed for the relief of menopausal symptoms.
Seaman graduated from Oberlin College in 1956 and began her career in writing by editing local women's publications. Seaman began freelance writing in 1960, selling her first magazine article about resisting post-delivery medication while breast-feeding. She wrote health columns for McCall's and authored pieces on the effects of natural childbirth.
In 1968, Seaman received a Sloan-Rockefeller Science Writing Fellowship and a certificate in science writing from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She conducted extensive research on birth control pill risks, including blood clots and depression. Seaman served as Vice President of the Women's Medical Center in New York from 1971 to 1973 and was a board member of the National Organization for Women. She was an influential public speaker and lecturer and advocated for women's health rights, mostly on the issue of diethylstilbestrol (DES). She co-authored The Menopause Industry: How the Medical Establishment Exploits Women in 1994 and edited The Practice and Politics of Women's Health in 1999. From 1997 until her death in 2008, she served as a judge for the Project Censored Awards and served on the educational board of Women Promoting non-profit and the Feminist Press, while mentoring young feminists and offering her contacts, ideas, and even her apartment as a resource.
Seaman received several awards for her work, including the Pioneer Woman Award from the American Association of Retired Persons, the Athena Award from the National Council for Women's Health, and the Health Advocacy Award from the American Public Health Association.
When the birth control pill came on the market in 1960, Barbara was writing columns for women's magazines such as Brides and the Ladies' Home Journal. She launched her career as a women's health journalist and brought a new kind of health reporting to the field, writing articles that centered more on the patient and less on the medical fads of the day. Seaman was first to reveal that women lacked the information they needed to make informed decisions on child-bearing, breast-feeding, and oral contraceptives. She even went so far as to alert women to the dangers of the Pill, whose primary ingredient was estrogen (also the active ingredient in Premarin, which had contributed to the death of her aunt). Prolific output and the popularity of her published articles won Seaman membership in the prestigious Society of Magazine Writers. Through this organization she met Betty Friedan, who asked her to cover events such as the founding of NOW (1966), the founding of NARAL (1969), and other milestones in the development of second-wave feminism. Befriended by Gloria Steinem, Seaman also became a contributing editor at Ms. magazine.
Barbara Seaman
Barbara Seaman (September 11, 1935 – February 27, 2008) was an American author, feminist activist, and journalist, and a principal founder of the women's health movement.
Seaman, whose parents, Henry J. Rosner and Sophie Kimels, met at a Young People's Socialist League (1907) picnic, grew up in a politically progressive milieu. (Pete Seeger sang at her nursery school when she was four years old).
When she was in high school, Seaman won a writing contest. The prize was dinner with Eleanor Roosevelt, according to a 1997 interview of Seaman by author/attorney Karen Winner.
The death of her aunt Sally from endometrial cancer at age 49, in 1959, sensitized Seaman to women's health issues at an early age. Her aunt's oncologist attributed her death to Premarin, which her gynecologist had prescribed for the relief of menopausal symptoms.
Seaman graduated from Oberlin College in 1956 and began her career in writing by editing local women's publications. Seaman began freelance writing in 1960, selling her first magazine article about resisting post-delivery medication while breast-feeding. She wrote health columns for McCall's and authored pieces on the effects of natural childbirth.
In 1968, Seaman received a Sloan-Rockefeller Science Writing Fellowship and a certificate in science writing from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She conducted extensive research on birth control pill risks, including blood clots and depression. Seaman served as Vice President of the Women's Medical Center in New York from 1971 to 1973 and was a board member of the National Organization for Women. She was an influential public speaker and lecturer and advocated for women's health rights, mostly on the issue of diethylstilbestrol (DES). She co-authored The Menopause Industry: How the Medical Establishment Exploits Women in 1994 and edited The Practice and Politics of Women's Health in 1999. From 1997 until her death in 2008, she served as a judge for the Project Censored Awards and served on the educational board of Women Promoting non-profit and the Feminist Press, while mentoring young feminists and offering her contacts, ideas, and even her apartment as a resource.
Seaman received several awards for her work, including the Pioneer Woman Award from the American Association of Retired Persons, the Athena Award from the National Council for Women's Health, and the Health Advocacy Award from the American Public Health Association.
When the birth control pill came on the market in 1960, Barbara was writing columns for women's magazines such as Brides and the Ladies' Home Journal. She launched her career as a women's health journalist and brought a new kind of health reporting to the field, writing articles that centered more on the patient and less on the medical fads of the day. Seaman was first to reveal that women lacked the information they needed to make informed decisions on child-bearing, breast-feeding, and oral contraceptives. She even went so far as to alert women to the dangers of the Pill, whose primary ingredient was estrogen (also the active ingredient in Premarin, which had contributed to the death of her aunt). Prolific output and the popularity of her published articles won Seaman membership in the prestigious Society of Magazine Writers. Through this organization she met Betty Friedan, who asked her to cover events such as the founding of NOW (1966), the founding of NARAL (1969), and other milestones in the development of second-wave feminism. Befriended by Gloria Steinem, Seaman also became a contributing editor at Ms. magazine.