Author Harriet Washington will be the first featured speaker of the 2011-12 academic year for the Central College Writers Reading series on Sept. 15 at 7:30 p.m. Washington will read excerpts from her book “Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present” in the Cox-Snow Recital Hall. The Writers Reading series features monthly readings from various authors and poets.
An award-winning medical writer and editor, Washington has been recognized by organizations such as the National Book Critics Circle, the Black Caucus of the American Library Association, Publishers Weekly and Booklist. The author’s work focuses on bioethics, medical history, African American health issues and the intersection of medicine, ethics and culture.
“Medical Apartheid” explores the social history of medical research conducted on African Americans. The book is considered the first and only history of medical experimentation in the African American community. It analyzes the tradition of unethical medical experiments conducted on black populations, the most famous of which may be the Tuskegee syphilis experiment conducted over 40 years in the mid-1900s.
Washington’s reading is part of the community teach-in program, held in conjunction with the first year common reading. The event is free and open to the public.
