By Sandrine Exil
International Desk (EFE). – Black women and girls across the Americas highlight their continued struggle for recognition, safety, and equality on the International Day of Afro‑Latin, Afro‑Caribbean, and Diaspora Women and Girls. From the United States to Buenos Aires, they still face racial, gender, and economic injustice, despite centuries of resistance and leadership.
Invisibility and violence across the Americas
In the Dominican Republic, women of Haitian descent suffer legal invisibility, are denied citizenship, and have restricted access to basic rights.
“Deporting a pregnant woman is not just an act of migration, it’s institutional violence that risks two lives,” explained to EFE the Haitian anthropologist Dr. Evelyne Clergé.
In Cuba, Afro‑Cuban women encounter systemic racism in media, public life, and employment.
In Brazil, more than 40,000 Afro-Brazilians die yearly, including a disproportionate number of women, amid femicide and police violence.
In Colombia, armed conflict has displaced over 2 million Afro-Colombians, predominantly women and girls, according to the ombudsman’s office.
“Being a Black woman in Latin America means carrying the heaviest burdens with the least protection,” Cuban anthropologist Dr. Yenia Zamora told EFE.
In Argentina, Afro‑descendant women are nearly invisible. Only 0.66% of the population self-identifies as Afro-descendant in the 2022 Census, of which under 0.4% are women, despite genetic studies showing around 4% or more of the population has African ancestry.
“We are erased from history textbooks and politics, even though we built this nation,” activist Lucía Mbomío told EFE.
Haiti, a legacy lives on
One of the most powerful legacies in this fight comes from Haiti. While global conversations on afro-descendant justice often center on the Global North, Haiti reminds us that the struggle is also deeply rooted in the Caribbean.
In Haiti, the fight for gender and racial justice is deeply rooted in the legacy of Madeleine Sylvain‑Bouchereau, the first Haitian woman to earn a doctorate in sociology.
Her landmark book “Haïti et ses femmes” (Haiti and its women) asserted:
“Political independence is meaningless without social justice. True freedom is a collective project that includes women, the rural poor, and the forgotten.”
Haiti is a country where women, from birth, need to battle. Maternal mortality remains extremely high, estimated at 582 deaths per 100,000 live births, among the worst in Latin America and the Caribbean.
“Young Haitian girls still grow up hearing that their place is in silence. But we carry Madeleine’s legacy, we reclaim our space in politics and public life,” remarks gender rights advocate Marie Lince, from Cap‑Haïtien.
UN Women reports estimate that over 3,000 pregnant women in Port-au-Prince face obstetric complications without timely care, and more than 500,000 displaced by violence lack protection and access to services.
US in 2025: Reproductive justice and structural inequality
In the US persistent racial disparities demand a closer look, especially when it comes to health care and reproductive justice and how structural inequality continues to shape the lives of Black women and girls.
Despite overall declines in maternal mortality, from 32.9 (2021) to 18.6 (2023) deaths per 100,000 live births, according to the Maternal Mortality Rates in the United States report from 2023.
The rate for non‑Hispanic Black women remains 50.3 per 100,000, more than three times higher than white women at 14.5. Black women also accounted for a disproportionate share of preventable maternal deaths in 2023.
Black girls face relentless criminalization in schools. The National Black Women’s Justice Institute reports that they are six times more likely to be suspended than white girls, contributing to educational inequities and invisibility, according to US Department of Education data.
“Black girls are over‑policed, underestimated, and overlooked,” says American sociologist Dr. Mariah Green. “Yet they continue to organize and lead change.”
From resistance to leadership
Despite persistent inequalities, Afro‑descendant women and girls are turning resistance into leadership.
From digital Afro‑feminism in Brazil to land rights movements in Colombia and cultural activism in Argentina and Cuba.
“This is not just about visibility, it’s about power,” says Dr. Nadège Jean‑Baptiste.
“We are rewriting policies, curricula, and futures.”
On Jul 25, activists remind the world: Afro‑descendant women and girls are not asking for inclusion, they are demanding transformation.
“We are not the shadows of history,” says Cuban activist Laura Nápoles. “We are its heartbeat.” EFE
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