Exploring the Dirty Side of Women's Health


Book Description

A team of international contributors give new insights into the key issues surrounding women's health, social anthropology and midwifery. They examine bodies, leakage and boundaries, illuminating the contradictions and dilemmas in women’s healthcare.




Exploring the Dirty Side of Women's Health


Book Description

In this book, a team of international contributors examine bodies, leakage and boundaries, illuminating the contradictions and dilemmas in women’s healthcare. Using the concept of pollution, this book highlights how women and health issues are categorised, and health workers and women are confined to roles and places defined as socially appropriate. The book explores in-depth current and historical practices, such as: childbirth and midwifery practice policies and social practices around breastfeeding gynaecological nursing, female incontinence and sexually transmitted infections miscarriages and termination of pregnancy. Addressing things out of place, from the idea of ‘dirty work’ to feeling ‘dirty’, from diagnoses that disrupt our self-image to beliefs and practices which undermine health service provision, this book uses the contradictions in our thinking around pollution and power to stimulate thinking around women’s health.




Birth and Birthgivers


Book Description

This volume presents waried essays exploring women's voices, agencies and aesthetics in the traditional handling of chilbearing. Ayurveda as it comprehends reproduction, sohars (birth songs), birth narratives cord-cutters, dais' knowledge and compensation systems, as well as analyses of biomedical dominance and erasure of indigenous knowledge all provide a peek bechind the purdah in this critical reclamation of tradition.




Picturing Women's Health


Book Description

The essays in this collection examine women in diverse roles; mother, socialite, prostitute, celebrity, medical practitioner and patient. The wide range of commentators allows a diverse picture of women’s health in this period.




Gender, Health and Healthcare


Book Description

Health status and the experience of working in health care roles are both strongly shaped by gender and, although there have been attempts to incorporate ‘gender awareness’ in both health and employment policies, the significance of gender in these areas continues to be marginalised within public debates and academic discourses. Taking a social constructionist perspective, Watts considers the ways in which gender impacts upon health in all its elements including access, technology, professionalisation, health promotion and health as an important sector of the labour market. She discusses gender as a developing and diversified category, exploring ideas about masculinity and the fluidity of gender boundaries in determining individual identity. Chapters that follow discuss men’s and women’s health; ideology of gender and health, specifically exploring different social norms and ideas about male and female health and the dominant ideological association between femaleness and caring; working for health with particular focus on the gendered interplay of caring and curing roles; technology and changes to gender, health and healthcare; health promotion as a gendered activity and, finally, the importance of introducing an intersectional approach beyond gender to articulate a deeper understanding of health in a postmodern context. The concluding chapter draws together these themes to underscore the importance of placing gender at the centre of health and health care delivery to fully take account of both the different life and health experiences of men and women and the gendered dimensions of working in health care.




Investigating Young People's Sexual Cultures


Book Description

This book examines ways of developing research on young people’s sexual cultures in the context of a media-saturated and technology-focused contemporary culture, an area of study that remains relatively unexplored despite heightened concern about young people, sex and culture. Unlike the widespread sensationalist reporting about the ‘pornification’ of young people’s lives and the policy documents which have emerged on ‘sexualization’, the book foregrounds the need for a critical approach which recognizes the complexity of culture and is able to unpack what is at stake in the construction of particular views and practices. It emphasizes how concerns about ‘harm’ and ‘risk’, however well-intentioned, can work against young people’s interests and argues that education will only be effective if it engages with young people and is based on a commitment to young people’s rights and to the broader notion of sexual rights. Drawing together key researchers in the area the book examines health policy, sex and relationships education, sex abuse therapy, television production, sport, internet use, and the production and consumption of commercial goods and media. This book will be of interest to the many academics and groups who are concerned with young people’s sexual cultures and their place within society. This book was originally published as a special issue of Sex Education.




Emotions in Midwifery and Reproduction


Book Description

With contributions from a range of leading international authors, this 'stop and make you think' book explores the many contemporary issues surrounding emotion work in reproductive healthcare. The editors, forerunners in their field, have brought together both theoretical and clinical aspects to challenge readers to consider the significance of this important topic in their day-to-day work. Using examples of maternity care and infertility settings from the UK and beyond, and with an emphasis on personal reflection throughout, the book explores the subjects of: - Emotional well-being - Client-practitioner relationships - Infertility - Loss - Breast feeding - Motherhood Emotions in Midwifery and Reproduction underlines the importance of emotions and how they are managed, experienced and negotiated in clinical settings, addressing issues that are frequently overlooked in the drive for efficiency and effectiveness in the health service. It is stimulating reading for all midwifery and nursing students and practitioners looking to understand their patients' and their own emotional needs.




The Midwife-Mother Relationship


Book Description

The foundation between midwife and mother is the foundation upon which maternity care depends. Covering completely new topics areas, the new edition of this ground-breaking text brings together classic and current research to establish key tenets for maternity care within hospital and home. This ground-breaking essential text reaffirms the fragility and the power of the relationship between midwife and mother and remains the definitive guide to the complex area of midwife-mother relations. New to this Edition: - Fully revised and expanded to reflect key developments in midwifery philosophy over the past decade, applying a theoretical approach to emerging concepts such as emotional labour and midwifery partnership - Covers completely new topics areas, including the effects of emotional labour, poverty and health policy - Combines new works from the previous edition with new chapters on innovative midwifery practice - Brings together classic and current research to establish key tenets for maternity care within hospital and home




Birth Rites and Rights


Book Description

This multi-disciplinary collection of essays from the Cambridge Socio-Legal Group is concerned with the varying circumstances, manner, timing and experiences of birth. It contains essays from a wide range of disciplines including law, medicine, anthropology, history and sociology, examining birth from the perspectives of mother, doctor, midwife and father. Questions considered in the book include: who has power during the birthing process? How has the experience of birth changed over time? Should birth mark a significant change in the legal status of the foetus? What is the proper role of birth registration? What role, if any, do fathers have in the birthing process? What legal rights should the woman have to refuse treatment during the birthing process? What is the significance of changes of the age at which women give birth? This stimulating collection of papers provides new insights into one of life's most momentous moments.




There's More to Life Than This


Book Description

For fans of TLC’s Long Island Medium and anyone interested in the big questions of life, death, and finding out what’s important in between, New York Times bestselling author and medium Theresa Caputo shares how she discovered her gift and her many encounters with Spirit. Beloved medium Theresa Caputo, star of the hit television show Long Island Medium, opens the door to her world and invites you to experience her exceptional gift of communicating with those who’ve crossed over to the Other Side. The always funny, frank, and down-to-earth medium—whether she’s talking to her family, the local butcher, or the souls of those who’ve passed on—began communicating with Spirit at the age of four, but didn’t fully accept her gift until she was thirty-three years old. She had a good life as a busy wife and working mom, but also suffered from chronic anxiety that, as it turned out, came from ignoring her abilities. Once Theresa began channeling, she realized that she felt much better after delivering a message from Spirit and releasing that energy. Since then she’ s used her extraordinary gift to help people heal from the loss of their loved ones. Theresa feels that it’s her purpose to make us all aware that there is more to life than what we see here in the physical world. She wants you to know that your deceased loved ones are safe and at peace, and that they’re now with you in a different way—watching over you, loving you, and assisting you from the Other Side. She also wants you to realize that the unexplainable things you sense and feel from these souls are real, and that it’s healthy and essential to acknowledge them. There’s More to Life Than This lends insight on how Theresa’s mediumship works, what happens to your soul when you die, what Spirit says Heaven is like, what the deceased want you to know, the importance of living a positive life, and the many roles that your family, friends, angels, guides, souls of faith, and God play here and in the afterlife. It also explores how to safely connect with Spirit, so that you can recognize when your loved ones are reaching out. Through Theresa’s personal story, compelling anecdotes, and fascinating client readings, she teaches us about how she communicates with Spirit and helps us to understand and appreciate the important lessons and touching messages that we’re meant to embrace every day.