2026 FCP Grant Recipient and Project
Narrative Sovereignty: Abortion, Embodiment & Feminist Infrastructure
Birthing Feminist Lineage: Abortion as Embodied Practice and Lived Experience as Knowledge in Self-Managed Systems by Lynsey Bourke, Rouge Doulas
Executive Summary
Abortion lives inside a fractured feminine-between Eve & Lilith, Madonna & Whore-pulled into a moral battleground where the womb is claimed by the State, reduced by pro-choice frameworks to a clinical event, and appropriated by anti-abortion narratives as "spiritual"terrain, leaving us, who've had abortions without language to hold this depth, and without practitioners trained to meet it. This work builds upon pockets of feminist work on abortion, to birth a lineage. I have spent the last two decades pouring over everything written on the topic to better understand my own abortions, and the experiences of the collective. The post-Roe feminists who pioneered emotional abortion counseling-and mentored me-are aging and passing on, and their work has not been integrated into abortion telehealth or virtual support.
In response to a world of increasing misogyny, was to birth Rouge Abortion Doula
School-which has now trained over 150 doulas in this new, evolved, model-teaching how to hold neutral space for individual truths to bloom. The choice of whether to give birth or to have an abortion is sacred, and must be made from agency in which the head, the heart, the womb and the sex are all aligned.
This year I begin my PhD at the African Gender Institute at the University of Cape Town, where I will spend the coming years writing and theorizing about abortion, transforming two decades of lived and learned experiences into this new framework. Core outputs include a digital abortion reflection tool - an evolution of earlier feminist resources not yet accessible to digital generations - a growing body of research, and a future book-length work. The €30,000 grant will serve as catalytic funding to advance this work at a critical stage, supporting the development of the digital tool, core personnel, and the research and dissemination necessary to formalize and scale this model across contexts.
What will concretely exist in the world at the end of this project that does not exist today?
By the end of this project, a fully articulated and field-tested model of feminist abortion accompaniment will exist-one that fundamentally redefines self-managed abortion care by integrating emotional, embodied, and relational support. This model will be actively implemented across telehealth contexts in Africa through Musoya Health where abortion pill delivery is paired with Rouge-trained doulas providing care in this way. A digital abortion reflection tool will be embedded across Rouge and Musoya platforms, enabling abortion seekers to process and make meaning of their experiences, while contributing-by choice-to a living body of feminist knowledge, disseminated on line and in publications. Together, the
model, tool, training, and research will formalize a transformative framework for abortion counseling within telehealth-one that centers agency, alignment, and complexity-and is positioned to influence clinical practice, research agendas, and the global discourse.
The €30,000 moves this project from practice to framework, integrating approaches already in use to transforming lived practices into a cohesive, documented, and scalable model.
Specifically, it will fund:
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The development and deployment of the digital accompaniment tool
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Core personnel to coordinate implementation across Rouge and Musoya Health
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Research synthesis and writing totranslate livedexperience intorigorous, publishable feminist knowledge
Key Team Members
Lynsey Bourke (Project Lead, Executive Director, Rouge Doulas) Founder of Rouge Doulas and co-founder of Musoya Health. Her work focuses on developing feminist approaches to abortion counseling that center lived experience, embodiment, and relational care. Currently starting a PhD at the African Gender Institute (University of Cape Town), where this project's research component is situated.
Rouge Doulas Network and Rouge Abortion Doula School (www.rougedoulas.org)
The Doula School is a 6 month training course, offered annually, and has trained 150 doulas.
Dr. Benita Moolman (Phd Advisor, African Gender Institute, University of Cape Town) Professor and researcher specializing in African feminist theories and narrative methodologies.
Sonia Savadogo & Lilian Muchoki (Co-Directors) Musoya Health (www.musoyahealth.com)
Sonia is a midwife from Burkina Faso with decades of experience in abortion care, Lilian is a communications specialist from Kenya specialized in virtual abortion care websites and comms.
Project Duration and Timeline
Total duration of the project: 24 months
Proposed start date: July 2026 - June 2028
Contribution to Feminist Research, Public Discourse, and Structural Change
This project shifts abortion care from a transactional event to a relational one. By integrating accompaniment into telehealth systems, it contributes to:
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Feminist research: Producing one of the first large-scale, practice-based datasets on abortion as lived experience, spanning emotional, physical, and relational dimensions
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Public discourse: Expanding dominant narratives beyond safety and access to include meaning-making, embodiment, and complexity
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Structural change: Demonstrating a viable, scalable model for embedding feminist counseling within telehealth abortion systems
Evaluation of success
Success will be evaluated through alignment between implementation, user experience, and knowledge production, including (by the end of 12 months) By the end of 24 months, the PhD will be completed, along with the potential for additional journal articles, and publications.
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12,000 abortion seekers receiving integrated accompaniment through Musova
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30 committed Rouge Doulas embedded in service delivery
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15,000 of abortion seekers counseled by Rouge Doulas worldwide
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2,000 users engage with the digital reflection tool and volume of collected narratives
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quality and depth of qualitative data generated (tool + interviews)
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1 journal articles published, inline with PhDthesis evidence of modelrefinement and readiness for replication