Denise Herd is a professor of Public Health at UC Berkeley. Herd was born in Chicago, Illinois, where she spent her early childhood before her family's move to California. She spent her undergraduate years at UC Riverside and later UC Berkeley, where she obtained a BA in Anthropology in 1972. After attending UC Berkeley, Herd went on to earn a master's degree in Anthropology from San Francisco State University in 1978 and a PhD in Medical Anthropology from UC San Francisco in 1985. As a graduate student, Herd worked at UC in the university's Alcohol Research Group, where she studied racial health disparities and alcohol consumption in the African American community. In 1987, she joined the faculty in the School of Public Health. In this interview, Herd discusses her research on health disparities and alcohol use and other topics, including the liquor industry's marketing targeting young black men, the historical roots of the black temperance movement, as well as her role as associate director of UC Berkeley's Othering & Belonging Institute. This interview is part of a group of interviews documenting the history of the UC Berkeley School of Public Health.