Bex Groth is a PhD student in Sociology at the University of Georgia who specializes in the intersections of political and medical sociology, gender studies and social movements. Specifically, they are interested in how communities advance access to stigmatized healthcare using demedicalized strategies. Alongside research, Bex is involved community education and in public abortion storytelling work. Using digital ethnographic methods, their master’s research explored the social and emotional dimensions of abortion accompaniment activism in Mexico.

Connecting the movements for reproductive justice and transgender liberation, their current dissertation project analyzes how people access abortion and gender-affirming care outside of health systems in the U.S. South. Applying a mixed-method approach, they examine two types of healthcare that people frequently access outside of medical institutions: Self-Managed Abortion (SMA) and gender-affirming Hormone Replacement Therapy (commonly referred to as DIY-HRT).

Using interviews with transgender abortion activists as a theoretical point of departure, their research explores community provision of stigmatized healthcare to demonstrate the symbolic and practical connections between reproductive justice and transgender liberation. Informed by a shared goal of advancing bodily autonomy, this project asks: What lessons can self-managed abortion and DIY-HRT advocates learn from each other? Given the reversal of federal abortion rights and increased restrictions on transgender healthcare, this research offers a glimpse into how health movements navigate structural barriers to healthcare and reclaim rights to bodily autonomy amidst state repression.