Black women and girls across the American South face a crisis. In April alone, at least 10 Black women were murdered and 8 Black children were killed through gender-based violence. Black women face murder rates more than double those of white women, and they die from pregnancy-related complications at rates three times higher.
Meanwhile, the healthcare system is abandoning them. More than 40 maternity care providers have shuttered nationwide as federal cuts deepen, leaving expecting mothers without care options.
Into this emergency steps the Southern Black Girls and Women's Consortium with an unconventional response: a nine-city celebration called the 2026 Joy and Justice Tour.
"Joy has always been our strategy," said LaTosha Brown, the organization's founder. "But in this moment, joy is also our intervention."
When systems are failing and bodies are at risk, the choice to gather, celebrate and create spaces of healing and connection becomes political and becomes survival, Brown said.
The tour launches during Juneteenth weekend in Jackson, Mississippi. Nine cities across the South will host free programming, including interactive workshops, wellness activities, live entertainment and direct advocacy resources.
Accompanying the tour is an expanded grant cycle for the Black Girls Defense Fund, with applications closing May 14. Organizations working on health, safety, justice, carceral reform and restorative justice for Black girls and women across 13 Southern states can apply for grants ranging from $5,000 to $20,000.
The grants target adultification bias — the phenomenon in which Black girls are perceived as less innocent and less deserving of protection than their peers. Research shows this bias follows Black girls through schools, into the juvenile justice system and into hospitals where maternal care providers have grown indifferent to their suffering.
"We are in a state of emergency," said Chanceé Lundy, the organization's executive director. "Black women in the South are dying at rates this nation has learned to accept as normal."
The Southern Black Girls and Women's Consortium focuses exclusively on 13 Southern states — a region that receives less than 1% of the $4.8 billion in annual philanthropic investments channeled to Black women and girls. The organization was founded in 2017 to redirect resources to where they're most needed and least likely to arrive through traditional channels.
Since its founding, the organization has awarded more than $11.4 million to more than 250 organizations and distributed more than $600,000 in micro-grants directly to girls through initiatives like the #BlackGirlJoyChallenge.
The Joy and Justice Tour is designed to shift how this work is discussed. Rather than focusing solely on crisis narratives, the organization is framing joy as essential infrastructure.
"Joy is not a luxury," Lundy said. "Joy is strategy. And right now, joy is how we protect each other."
A nine-city tour cannot solve femicide or maternal mortality crises on its own, and grant funding cannot substitute for systemic reform. But these tools create space for people already doing this work to connect, share strategy and feel supported. Community gathering reminds everyone involved — organizers, activists, girls, women and families — that they are not alone.
