March 14: Celebrate Black Midwives Day!

What is Black Midwives Day?

Black Midwives Day is a national campaign launched in 2023 by the National Black Midwives Alliance and the Southern Birth Justice Network to establish March 14 as a day of awareness, education, advocacy, and celebration. Black Midwives Day is officially recognized in a growing number of states, including Virginia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Rhode Island and was introduced as a bill in the US Congress in 2025.

As the Black midwife who founded Black Midwives Day, I can say this holiday exists because our legacy was nearly erased, and because we are still here. We have survived. - we are reclaiming and rebuilding.

“They thought they buried you, but what they did was bury a seed.” 

- Ernesto Cardenal

Black midwives have been crucial healthcare providers on this land since before the inception of slavery, upon first arriving to the Americas. The first Black midwives in what is now the United States were African women who carried healing knowledge from their homelands. Even in bondage, they preserved our traditions. They caught babies. They buried placentas. They whispered prayers. They held families together in the face of violence, segregation, and systemic neglect. They were social safety buffers for many Black families, helping them navigate treacherous white supremacist systems with grace, wisdom and resilience.

Beginning in the late 19th century, the American Medical Association (AMA) (led primarily by white, wealthy male doctors) launched racist and sexist attacks on Black midwives specifically, seeking to discredit and regulate midwifery as part of the movement toward medicalization of birth. As a result of these attacks, in many states, it became a requirement to hold a nursing degree to practice midwifery, posing a significant barrier to access and autonomy.

Though there were thousands of Black grand midwives across the South, attending an estimated 75% of births in the region during the 1800s and early 1900s, the numbers were greatly reduced through Jim Crow tactics and the systematic removal of community midwives in the 20th century. The decimation of midwifery across the Southern United States decreased the numbers of Black midwives from thousands to just dozens in a 50-year period from the 1920s to the 1970s, leaving many communities without care providers.

Black midwives have historically provided holistic, community-centered care, yet have been systematically excluded from health care systems through restrictive policies and regulations. The resurgence of Black midwifery is a testament to midwives' resilience and their commitment to reclaiming traditional birthing practices that prioritize respect, autonomy, and positive health outcomes.

 

Why Black Midwives Day matters to me

In 2019, I was honored by the City of Miami, Florida and presented with the Trailblazer Award. Alongside that honor, the City proclaimed March 14 as “Jamarah Amani Day” each year. However, when I stood at that podium, I knew that the day did not belong to me. It belonged to Black midwives.

As someone who has spent over 15 years reclaiming birthwork traditions in Black communities in South Florida, this day matters so much to me. I am a Black mother. I am a Licensed Midwife. I serve as Executive Director of the Southern Birth Justice Network and co-founder of the National Black Midwives Alliance. But before all of that, in 2008, I came to Miami as a student midwife. 

Shortly after arriving in the city, I attended a meeting at a local community org in the historically Black community of Overtown to talk about something simple: Where did the midwives go? Elders started sharing birth stories. Someone remembered a midwife who rode her bicycle through Overtown, checking on pregnant women. Many remembered home births and a sense of dignity in the care.

The consistent memory was this: People felt safer. People felt held. People felt known. And folks said, “Not as many babies were dying.” That meeting became a doorway. From there, I began working in Overtown and our birth justice work grew.

In my heart, I held all of those years of work of reclaiming midwifery for Black folks. When I walked up to accept my award, in my acceptance speech, I said:

“I learned from elder midwives about birth goddesses and patience, what it means to support a mama with grace, how to maintain joy and self-care as a midwife. My elders gave me the story of the Black midwife, our legacy, which I carry in my heart always….. May March 14 forever be known not as Jamarah Amani Day but as Black Midwives Day.”

Because this work is not about individual recognition. It is about collective restoration.

 

Birth Justice Is a Social Justice Movement

Black Midwives Day cannot be separated from the broader movements that shape our survival.

Birth justice is deeply connected to reproductive justice, Black feminism, anti-racism, and anti-fascism; because structural systems were built on our backs and at the expense of our well-being. Because our pain is frequently dismissed. Because our autonomy is questioned.

Reproductive justice (a framework created by Black women) affirms the right to have children, not have children, and to raise our children in safe and sustainable communities. Birth justice is the perinatal expression of that framework. It demands dignity before pregnancy, during pregnancy, throughout labor, and especially during postpartum.

Black feminism has always taught us that the body is political. Controlling Black women’s reproduction has been central to white supremacy, from forced breeding during enslavement to forced sterilization to modern-day medical neglect. When Black women die in childbirth at higher rates, that is structural violence.

Anti-racism requires us to name how racism operates in clinical decision-making, hospital hierarchies, insurance structures, funding allocations, and legislative priorities. It shows up in who is trained, who is licensed, who is reimbursed, and who is criminalized.

And anti-fascism, at its core, resists authoritarian control over bodies. It resists centralized systems that concentrate power and diminish community autonomy. Black community midwifery represents decentralized care, relational accountability, and collective decision-making. It insists that birth does not belong solely to institutions.

Birth justice is about reclaiming that power. Birth Justice reminds us that our bodies are not battlegrounds, our births are not experiments and our survival is not optional.

And yet, Black maternal health remains in crisis. Black birthing people experience disproportionately high rates of pregnancy-related complications and death regardless of income or education. Many communities live in maternity care deserts, lacking access to hospitals or birth centers.

Midwives are part of the solution.

Research shows what our ancestors already practiced: midwifery improves outcomes, reduces unnecessary intervention, and lowers disparities. When care is culturally congruent, respectful, and relationship-based, families thrive.

But Black midwives were systematically excluded from healthcare systems through restrictive policies and regulations. Their removal disrupted a vital channel for transmitting cultural knowledge and community-based health practices.

Without midwives at the center of the community, we lose more than providers.

We lose cultural memory, shared language and the sacredness of birth.

Black Midwives Day restores that channel.

Our Goals

Black Midwives Day seeks to:

• Celebrate Black midwives as crucial healthcare workers
• Preserve the cultural history of Black midwifery as part of the story of America
• Advocate for accessible training and education pathways
• Support regulation that allows trained midwives to practice fully within their scope
• Educate the public about the measurable effectiveness of midwifery care
• Align midwifery education, practice and policies with the Birth Justice framework

Investing in midwifery education, ensuring fair pay, and removing unnecessary practice restrictions are essential to rebuilding this workforce.

Black Midwives Day is both a celebration and a call to action.

Black Midwives Day honors ancestral wisdom and modern expertise; acknowledges historical exclusion and present resilience; commits to reducing maternal and infant deaths; and demands that we name racism as the root cause of preventable loss.

Our legacy will not be erased again if we celebrate Black Midwives Day annually on March 14, and live out its principles every day by supporting Black midwives and Black families.

Ways to Celebrate Black Midwives Day

Black Midwives Day is not just a moment of recognition; it is an invitation to act.

Here are meaningful ways to participate in March 14:

1. Learn About and Support the Founding Organizations

Southern Birth Justice Network (SBJN)

The Southern Birth Justice Network is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit advancing birth justice through storytelling, popular education, community organizing, and direct service. SBJN works to expand access to midwifery care, train the next generation of birth workers, advocate for policy change, and build community-rooted infrastructure.

Ways to engage: Download SBJN’s Birth Justice Bill of Rights

National Black Midwives Alliance (NBMA)

The National Black Midwives Alliance launched the campaign to establish March 14 as Black Midwives Day nationwide. NBMA works to preserve the cultural history of Black midwifery, advocate for regulatory reform, expand midwifery education pathways, and elevate Black midwives across all credentials and traditions.

Ways to engage: Join NBMA (you don’t have to be a midwife)

NBMA ensures that Black midwifery remains visible, valued, and viable.

 

2. Support Black Midwife-Owned Businesses

Celebration must include solidarity. Economic support sustains the workforce.

Gracie Deola’s

Gracie Deola’s centers maternity apparel and products designed with Black women in mind, affirming beauty, dignity, and cultural pride during pregnancy and postpartum. Supporting Black-owned maternal health brands helps reshape how Black motherhood is seen and valued.

Ways to engage: Purchase products for yourself or as gifts

 

Midwife in a Box

Midwife in a Box is a birth justice innovation rooted in restoring portable, community-based care. It provides curated tools, supplies, and culturally grounded resources to support midwives and birth workers, especially in maternity care deserts and underserved communities.

Supporting Midwife in a Box means:

• • Investing in preparedness and access
  • Supporting decentralized, community-rooted care
  • Helping midwives practice safely within their training and scope

Ways to engage: You purchase or sponsor a box, or amplify the initiative so more families can benefit.

 

3. Support the Establishment of Birth Centers Owned and Operated by Black Midwives

Black Midwives Day is about infrastructure. Black midwife-led birth centers represent autonomy, cultural continuity, and community leadership. Birth centers are not luxuries. They are lifesaving infrastructure.

SBJN Birth Center Campaign

The SBJN Birth Center Campaign is working to establish a Black midwife-owned and operated birth center grounded in birth justice principles. This campaign invests in:

• • A permanent community wellness and birth space
  • Workforce development and training pipelines
  • Continuity of care from prenatal through postpartum
  • A model that blends ancestral wisdom with modern medicine

You can:

• • Donate directly to the campaign
  • Share the campaign with your network
  • Host a fundraiser or giving circle

Birth Center Equity’s “Beloved Birth 50 by 50”

By 2050, 50% of babies in the US will be born under the care of midwives.

Today, birth care in the US is failing our babies, our families, and our communities.
The time is now for real solutions, for courage and vision.

You can:

Consider donating directly to the campaign and sharing it with your friends and network. Every bit of support helps, and together, we can make a meaningful difference!

4. Buy and read books by Black midwives

• Mothering the Mother by Shafia Monroe, Traditional Midwife
• When Birth Calls by Sekesa Berry, Traditional Midwife
• A Black Woman’s Guide to Homebirth by Okunsola Amadou, CPM

5. Additional Ways to Celebrate

• Sign the petition
• Share educational content about Black midwifery history
• Invite Black midwives to speak at your institution
• Advocate for local or state proclamations recognizing March 14 (see our BMD toolkit)
• Donate to scholarships for Black midwifery students
• Thank a Black midwife publicly

Guest blog post by Jamarah Amani, LM