The Entourage Lab.
entourage (noun, French): the people who surround
Maternal support reduces the risk of maternal stress, injury, and death. Support is more effective when shared across a group of people rather than expected from one person. Our goal is to identify and promote the most effective ways to support pregnant people and new moms because we believe that everyone can and should contribute to maternal care. All pregnant people and new moms deserve robust support from their family, friends, and community.
The Entourage Lab is a multidisciplinary, transnational collective of scholars focused on networks of support around pregnant people and new moms. We are medical anthropologists, epidemiologists, and public health practitioners with interests in family health, midwifery care, doula services, and fatherhood involvement. We draw from cross-cultural, political economic, and scientific perspectives of kinship, gender, social support and pregnancy to illuminate and enrich our conclusions.
Q1: How do kin, kith, and communities provide care for pregnant and postpartum people and how does that care reduce maternal morbidity and mortality?
Q2: What are the historical and political relationships between American ideals of “the family” and global/public health education, research, and practice?
Current Projects
Dads & Doulas (Florida): 2023-Present
This multi-year cognitive ethnographic research project aims to map how dads and doulas think about maternal support, compare their perceptions, and find points of agreement and complementarity. Our goal is to identify strategies for effective collaboration and develop training modules for both dads and doulas to become a stronger, more robust support system for pregnant people and new mothers.
Deliverables: Training modules for dads and doula certification programs; Peer-reviewed articles and conference posters for student career development
Bajenu Gox (Senegal): 2024-Present
This evaluation looks at Bajenu Gox (BG) in the West African country of Senegal. BG is a state-funded program that hires and trains women in each neighborhood and village in the country with a curriculum of reproductive, maternal, and child health. These women (called “bajen”) educate their neighbors about what to expect during pregnancy, help them navigate the healthcare system, lead child vaccination campaigns, and much, much more. Our goal is to better understand what makes this program both incredibly popular and effective so that it might be replicated in some way elsewhere.
Deliverables: Evaluation report for the Senegalese Ministry of Health and Social Action; Peer-reviewed articles and conference posters for student career development
Yaayu Daara (Senegal): Coming in 2025
This long-term ethnographic research project explores a model of community-based foster parenting in Senegal knowns as yaayu daara, or “daara mother.” In a small fishing village outside Dakar, a daara (Koranic boarding school) pairs students with women in the community who feed them and provide clothing and supplies, essentially becoming de facto foster mothers. Through their religious piety, the women become bonded to their foster students and advocate for them in school and in healthcare. Our goal is to examine this system of foster care, as well as how local kinship and gender norms map onto notions of division of labor at the community level, thereby promoting child health.
Deliverables: Ethnographic monograph book; Peer-reviewed journal articles; Conference presentations