I am Tamiz Oliveira, a black woman. I have an academic and professional path shaped by confrontations in the fight against racism and sexism, characteristic of the experiences of black women in Brazil.
I have graduated in Social Work from the Universidade Federal do Recôncavo da Bahia (UFRB), where I experienced scientific initiation in research groups related to the health of black population and I wrote a dissertation on National Integral Health Policy for the Black Population, proposing a reflection on institutional racism perpetrated by health professionals.
I have completed a postgraduate degree in Collective Health (FAVENI), and a master’s degree in Ethnic Relations and Contemporaneity, at the Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia (UESB), where I wrote my dissertation on black women’s motherhood, obstetric violence and institutional racism.
As a teacher, I have worked in undergraduate courses on Social Work and in postgraduate courses on Human Rights, and on Traditional Peoples and Communities. I have also worked as a Social Worker in the “Corra Pro Abraço” Programme, an initiative of the State Government of Bahia which gives assistance to homeless and vulnerable people, based on Damage Reduction strategies.
Writing about us and for us is particularly important to me. Now, in the ongoing PhD course at the Institute of Collective Health (ISC/UFBA), I integrate the Eclipse group, an environment for learning, sharing, and constructing. I am developing a research on the “Intersectionality of gender and race: experiences of people with cutaneous leishmaniasis in the countryside of Bahia”. Therefore, I see my participation in the Eclipse project as a powerful fuel for the development of my academic studies, and a political training in establishing a relationship between theory and practice.