Expectations of Motherhood: Citizenship and Political Mobilization for Midwifery in Virginia (2003)
Craven, Christa C. (Author)
American University
Leap, William L.
Edition Details: Advisor: Leap, William L.
Physical Details: 309 pp.
Language: English
What prompts women to become politically mobilized around healthcare issues? And how do their resultant expectations and strategies influence the outcome of their mobilization? In this study, I explore women's support of midwifery and homebirth in the context of political and economic changes around healthcare and shifting cultural meanings of motherhood and citizenship in the United States. The recent grassroots organization among homebirthers in Virginia to enhance local midwifery services is the subject of this inquiry. First, I demonstrate historically how women's political mobilization around past healthcare initiatives---such as the movement to improve infant and maternal health in the early 1900s and the Natural Childbirth Movement during the mid- to late 1900s---has further stratified, rather than ameliorated, women's uneven access to healthcare services. Most often, these movements have enhanced reproductive options for white, middle-class and affluent women, but have continued to restrict the reproductive choices of women of color and poor women. In this context, the contemporary political organizing for homebirth midwifery in Virginia---primarily among white, educated women who represent a variety of political, religious, and class backgrounds---further illustrates the diverse expectations and experiences of motherhood, citizenship, and political action among different constituencies of women. In response to medical and state characterizations of homebirthers as pathological mothers, many midwifery supporters have denied participation in political activity---although they continued to perform actions that they defined as political. This seemingly paradoxical strategy is one way that some homebirthers understood themselves as political actors, but only in their capacity as respectable, apolitical mothers. Additionally, some midwifery advocates have begun to define themselves as consumers of healthcare services---particularly in conversation with government officials---reflecting a neoliberal definition of citizenship under which the state prioritizes consumer rights over the social, economic, and political rights of its citizens. In this dissertation, I explore the consequences of these strategies for midwifery supporters. I highlight the contradictions between most midwifery supporters' aspiration to support low-cost, community-based reproductive care for all women and the increasing commercialization and stratification of alternative healthcare in the U.S., including midwifery services.
...MoreDescription Cited in Diss. Abstr. Int. A 64 (2004): 4106. UMI order no. 3110981.
Similar Citations
Book
Rene Almeling;
(2020)
GUYnecology: The Missing Science of Men’s Reproductive Health
(/isis/citation/CBB484332667/)
Book
Natali Valdez;
(2021)
Weighing the Future: Race, Science, and Pregnancy Trials in the Postgenomic Era
(/isis/citation/CBB961294836/)
Book
Caron, Simone M.;
(2008)
Who Chooses? American Reproductive History since 1830
(/isis/citation/CBB000953167/)
Book
Prescott, Heather Munro;
(2011)
The Morning After: A History of Emergency Contraception in the United States
(/isis/citation/CBB001212465/)
Article
Giladi, Avner;
(2010)
Liminal Craft, Exceptional Law: Preliminary Notes on Midwives in Medieval Islamic Writings
(/isis/citation/CBB001031135/)
Thesis
Klein, Katherine Okuda;
(2002)
The growth of man-midwifery in Philadelphia and its environs, 1765--1848
(/isis/citation/CBB001562173/)
Article
Curtis, Stephan;
(2005)
Midwives and Their Role in the Reduction of Direct Obstetric Deaths during the Late Nineteenth Century: The Sundsvall Region of Sweden (1860--1890)
(/isis/citation/CBB000773940/)
Article
Cormack, Margaret;
(2012)
Introduction: Approaches to Childbirth in the Middle Ages
(/isis/citation/CBB001231399/)
Thesis
Sheridan, Bridgette Ann Majella;
(2002)
Childbirth, Midwifery, and Science: The Life and Work of the French Royal Midwife Louise Bourgeois (1563--1636)
(/isis/citation/CBB001562207/)
Book
Kass, Amalie M.;
(2002)
Midwifery and Medicine in Boston: Walter Channing, M.D., 1786--1876
(/isis/citation/CBB000320371/)
Book
Guilliland, Karen;
Pairman, Sally;
(2010)
Women's Business: The Story of the New Zealand College of Midwives, 1986--2010
(/isis/citation/CBB001033778/)
Article
Labouvie, Eva;
(2007)
Alltagswissen - Körperwissen - Praxiswissen - Fachwissen. Zur Aneignung, Bewertungs- und Orientierungslogik von Wissenskulturen
(/isis/citation/CBB000720200/)
Book
Balsoy, Gülhan;
(2013)
The Politics of Reproduction in Ottoman Society, 1838--1900
(/isis/citation/CBB001213221/)
Article
Craven, Christa;
Glatzel, Mara;
(2010)
Downplaying Difference: Historical Accounts of African American Midwives and Contemporary Struggles for Midwifery
(/isis/citation/CBB001202005/)
Article
Kateřina Lišková;
(2021)
History of Medicine in Eastern Europe: Sexual Medicine and Women’s Reproductive Health in Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary
(/isis/citation/CBB983224356/)
Article
Jennifer Fraser;
(2021)
Seizing the Means of Reproduction? Canada, Cancer Screening, and the Colonial History of the Cytopipette
(/isis/citation/CBB836159819/)
Book
Miranda R. Waggoner;
(2017)
The Zero Trimester: Pre-Pregnancy Care and the Politics of Reproductive Risk
(/isis/citation/CBB589678157/)
Book
Katherine Paugh;
(2017)
The Politics of Reproduction: Race, Medicine, and Fertility in the Age of Abolition
(/isis/citation/CBB922169542/)
Article
Karissa Haugeberg;
(2018)
Nursing and Hospital Abortions in the United States, 1967–1973
(/isis/citation/CBB277198782/)
Thesis
Halfmann, Drew T.;
(2001)
Interests in Contexts and Institutional Democracy: The Politics of Abortion Policy in Liberal Welfare States, 1950--2000
(/isis/citation/CBB001562377/)
Be the first to comment!