(photo by Yanina Manolova) Terrance Tabler, 4, sleeps on the sofa at his grandmother’s house in Pomeroy, Ohio, during a visit with his mother, Jessica Laudermilt, on Friday, May 1, 2009. In April of 2009, Laudermilt graduated from the Rural Women’s Recovery Program in Athens, Ohio. She endured several abusive relationships. Laudermilt was abusing drugs and alcohol. She had 5 children from 3 different men, and has lost custody of all of her children.Terrance Tabler, 4, sleeps on the sofa at his grandmother’s house in Pomeroy, Ohio, during a visit with his mother, Jessica Laudermilt, on Friday, May 1, 2009. In April of 2009, Laudermilt graduated from the Rural Women’s Recovery Program in Athens, Ohio. She endured several abusive relationships. Laudermilt was abusing drugs and alcohol. She had 5 children from 3 different men, and has lost custody of all of her children.
(photo by Alexandra Garcia) A student takes a break from volleyball practice at the Chande school and orphanage in Kitwe, Zambia.
(photo by Andrea Bruce/ The Washington Post) Halla gets a kiss from her son Iaad Hameed, 4, while her two-year-old drinks from a bottle. Halla’s husband was shot in the head and killed in the violence surrounding Baghdad during the war. She is now a prostitute in Iraq, trying to provide for her family.
(photo by Jamie Rose/ Momenta Workshops) A young girl helps her mother sell vegetables at an open-air market in the shadows of a local monastery in Inle Lake, Myanmar.
(photo by Michelle Frankfurter) Laredo, Texas From the series, “Borderlands” 2008
(photo by Irene Abdou) In the village of Kalabougou near Segou, Mali, women of the numu blacksmith’s population have worked for centuries as traditional potters. A seven-day fabrication cycle leads to the weekly Saturday afternoon firing of the kilns, in which large stacks of pots are covered with grass and set on fire.
(photo by Astrid Riecken) A woman waits patiently at a bus station in San Francisco, California.
(photo by Allison Shelley) Marie Luisa Badio, 44, waits at University Hospital in Port-au-Prince, Haiti for a set of promised operations for a tumor in her gastric system on March 1, 2010. The hospital’s Department of Internal Medicine was one of the few buildings not damaged in the January 12 quake and although the wing is still open to patients, the NGO resources supporting the rest of the hospital—housed in outdoor tents – are not available here.
(photo by Astrid Riecken) German-Turkish dancer and choreographer Nejla Y. Yatkin rehearses her solo performance Mata Hari. Her work explores the tragic life of Margaretha Geertruida "Grietje" Zelle MacLeod (whose stage name was Mata Hari), a Dutch exotic dancer, courtesan and accused spy who, although possibly innocent, was executed for espionage for Germany during World War I.
(photo by Erin C. Schwartz/ Columbia Missourian) Simmons celebrates her graduation from the University of Missouri School of Law with her sorority sisters on May 16, 2010. According to a January 2010 study by the Association for Legal Career Professionals, African American women account for just 0.57% of partners and 2.93% of associates in law firms nationally.
(photo by Gabriela Bulisova) In Chlaba, Slovakia during the 2010 summer, the photographer shares final moments with her ailing grandaunt.
(photo by Alexis C. Glenn/UPI) Angelisa Young holds a Marriage Bureau ticket indicating she and her partner of 12 years, Sinjoyla Townsend, as the first to apply for a marriage license outside of District of Columbia Superior Court in Washington on March 3, 2010. In December 2009, the DC Council approved a bill that would allow for same-sex marriages to be performed in the District. Opponents of gay marriage attempted to block the law, but the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday declined to intervene.
(photo by Jenna Isaacson Pfueller) American ex-pat Tanya Niemeyer enjoys a tuk-tuk ride through the streets of Hua Hin, Thailand on December 27, 2009. Hua Hin's clean beaches and vibrant street life are a huge draw for a large but tight-knit community of foreigners working abroad who use it as place to escape the chaos of nearby Bangkok.
(photo by Jaime Windon) Unkonda Sawyer, thrilled to be back in Shela, Lamu Island, Kenya, laughs aboard Felice.
(photo by Mary Calvert) Aliza Sikiliza (left) goes into labor in a dark room at Katsuva's farm. She was abducted by soldiers and held in captivity as a sex slave for five months before escaping. She is about to have the baby of one of her rapists. Katsuva listens with a stethoscope to the moaning woman's belly, and then leaves her alone. "Mamma Masika," as Katsuva is called, says the farm has helped nearly 6,000 women since it opened in 2000. More women turn up at the farm every week, and some go into labor on the rough journey to the farm.
(photo by Molly Riley) A Maasai woman poses for a portrait while selling jewelry in her village near Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania, July 7, 2010.
(photo by Melissa Golden) Inmate Takaya Patterson reads a letter from her mother inside her room at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville, OH. Her 9-mo-old son, Takeem is by her side thanks to a program that allows qualified pregnant inmates to keep their babies with them for up to 18 months.
(photo by Alexis C. Glenn/UPI) Carol Sours, of Browntown, Virginia, holds her 8-year old dog, Isabella, near the Lincoln Memorial during Memorial Day weekend in Washington DC on May 29, 2010. Sours, a motorcycle enthusiast, road to the National Mall on her motorcycle with her dog to celebrate the holiday weekend.
(photo by Nikki Kahn/ The Washington Post) A resident leans against a tree for support as she waits to bathe at the Azil Communal home for the aging population in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, on Monday, March 8, 2010.
(photo by Michelle Frankfurter) San Benito, Texas From the series, “Borderlands” 2008
(photo by Serli Lala) In the 11th century Monastery of Keeharis, located in Tsahkadzor, Armenia, a visiting American–Armenian drowns in the sun’s rays. With her head held high she relishes in what still resonates as the place of her ancestors while celebrating what she has brought--traditions that have survived.
(photo by Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post) Ciudad Juaraz Municipal police officer Noeme Martinez, center comforts Maria Campos, right, in the driveway of her house after learning that her husband was found brutally murdered. The war on drugs rages across Mexico claiming thousands of lives.
(photo by Nikki Kahn/ The Washington Post) Dusk settles around the room, enveloping the figures of volunteer Theresa Szkromiuk and Kimoi Rotich, a Kenyan immigrant. She keeps watch as the evening passes, matching her breath to his in a ritual of comfort.