Melissa Cheyney, PhD, is both a professor of clinical medical anthropology at Oregon State University and a practicing licensed midwife. She is a leading expert on the many ways parents' cultural backgrounds affect their goals for, and experience of, birth. She has served on the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine's "Birth Settings in America Study" and the "Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA) Statistics Project." She is the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Birth: Issues in Perinatal Care and the mother of a daughter born at home.
