Our Bodies Ourselves Timeline

THE FIRST DECADE

The publication of Our Bodies, Ourselves helps to launch the women's health movement in the United States.

1969  Twelve women meet during a women's liberation conference in Boston.  At a workshop on "women and their bodies," they talk about their own experiences with doctors and share their knowledge about their bodies. The discussions at the conference are so provocative and fulfilling that the following summer, each woman researches a health topic close to her heart. They decide to put their knowledge into an accessible form that can be shared with others and that can serve as a model for women who want to learn about themselves, communicate their findings with doctors, and challenge the medical establishment to change and improve the care that women receive.

1970  A 193-page course booklet on stapled newsprint entitled Women and Their Bodies is published by  New England Free Press.

1971  The authors change the name of the book to Our Bodies, Ourselves, to emphasize women taking full ownership of our bodies. Republished by New England Free Press, the book puts women's health in a radically new political and social context and quickly becomes an underground success.  It sells 250,000 copies, mainly by word-of-mouth. 

1972  The Boston Women's Health Book Collective formally incorporates.   

1973  Simon & Schuster publishes the first commercial edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves.

1976  A revised and updated version of Our Bodies, Ourselves is published. A national bestseller, it is recognized by the American Library Association's Young Adult Service Division as one of the best books of the decade.

1977  The Boston Women's Health Book Collective self-publishes Nuestros Cuerpos, Nuestras Vidas, the Spanish translation of Our Bodies, Ourselves.

1979  An update of Our Bodies, Ourselves is published and becomes a bestseller.

Our Bodies, Ourselves has stirred controversy since its inception.  It has been banned by high schools and public libraries across the country.  In the early 1980s, it was famously condemned by Jerry Falwell of the Moral Majority as "obscene trash."

THE SECOND AND THIRD DECADES

The success of Our Bodies, Ourselves necessitates a more formal organizational structure for The Boston Women's Health Book Collective. The group transitions away from a collective to a nonprofit organization with different program areas (see "What We Do Now").

1984  A revised version of the original classic, The New Our Bodies, Ourselves, is published.

1992  The New Our Bodies, Ourselves: Updated and Expanded for the 90s is published.

1998  Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century is published.

2000  A revised and culturally adapted edition of Nuestros Cuerpos, Nuestras Vidas is published, produced  with input from two dozen Latina organizations in the United States and Latin America.

2001 Judy Norsigian, a founder of the collective, becomes executive director of the nonprofit group, and three foreign language editions of OBOS  --  Armenian, Bulgarian and Serbian -- are published.

2002  Because most people associate the Boston Women's Health Book Collective with the book Our Bodies, Ourselves, the organization begins to do business under the name Our Bodies Ourselves.  The legally incorporated name remains the same. In addition, a Romanian edition of OBOS is published.

2004  A Polish translation of Our Bodies, Ourselves is published, as is an inspired French edition.

2005  Thirty-five years after Women and Their Bodies revolutionized women's health, a substantially revised Our Bodies, Ourselves is published for a new generation of women. In addition, a women's group in Korea publishes a Korean print edition, and an organization in India releases a book inspired by OBOS for Tibetan nuns. The Indian group also begins work on a "back translation" of their Tibetan edition into English.

2006  Our Bodies Ourselves produces a brand new book, Our Bodies, Ourselves: Menopause. This title launches a series of books that will provide in-depth information about specific topics in women's health. The organization also launches Our Bodies, Our Blog, a daily blog on women's health news and controversies. An Albanian edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves and a reprint of the 2004 French inspired-edition (for French-speaking Africa) are released.

2008  The new book Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth is published, as is the Russian adaptation of Our Bodies, Ourselves. Nepali and Turkish adaptations are forthcoming this year.

WHAT WE DO NOW

Our Bodies Ourselves is a nonprofit, public interest women's health education, advocacy, and consulting organization. We provide clear, evidence-based information about health, sexuality, and reproduction from a feminist and consumer perspective. We remain one of the few women's health groups in the U.S. that doesn't accept funds from pharmaceutical companies.  Our organization has four program areas:

PUBLICATIONS  Fresh from producing Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth, we are now working on an education campaign around the launch of our new book. We are also already thinking about the next edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves. 

LATINA HEALTH INITIATIVE  In addition to Nuestros Cuerpos, Nuestras Vidas (NCNV), the organization has produced Promotoras de Salud, a training guide for community lay health workers based on NCNV, and De Camino a la Maternidad (Journey to Parenthood), a booklet about childbirth. 

GLOBAL TRANSLATION/ADAPTATION PROGRAM   We are working with women's groups in East Africa (Kiswahili), India (Bangla), Israel (Hebrew/Arabic), Nepal, Nigeria (local dialects), and Turkey as they develop cultural adaptations or other publications inspired by Our Bodies, Ourselves.

PUBLIC VOICE AND ACTION  Our organization is a critical voice in policy, advocacy, and educational efforts related to women's health.  We have reached a wide audience with a feminist and consumer perspective on such issues as breast implants, direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs, and cloning and genetics. 

For more information about Our Bodies Ourselves and its programs, please contact Wendy Brovold at wendy@bwhbc.org or 617-451-3666, ext. 13.