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Ways of Knowing about Birth: Mothers, Midwives, Medicine & Birth Activism. Robbie Davis-Floyd. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, Inc., 2018. 438 pages. ISBN-13: 978-1478633624
Ways of Knowing about Birth is a compilation of Robbie Davis-Floyd's writings spanning thirty years. The selections in this volume offer valuable insights for many readers, from students of midwifery, anthropology and women's studies, to practicing midwives and obstetricians, to women who are seeking to inform themselves about their own childbirth care options. The writings are organized into fifteen chapters in three sections and may be read as selective stand-alone pieces or as a cohesive and complete work.
Robbie Davis-Floyd is a cultural anthropologist who has conducted groundbreaking research into childbirth, midwifery, and obstetrics. She is also a midwifery advocate and birth activist whose work has contributed to greater understanding and transformation of the practice of maternity care. In this book, Davis-Floyd revises, updates, and combines her most popular previously published journal articles and book chapters, adding new material, supplemental discussion questions, and recommended films and readings. The strength of the original writings is maintained and enhanced when presented in the context of this compilation of much of Davis-Floyd's "life's work."
Section one of Ways of Knowing about Birth examines the beliefs of society, birthing women, and obstetricians that lead them to either conform to or reject the dominant Western medical approach to childbirth. Chapter one lays the foundation of later writings by describing the technocratic, humanistic and holistic paradigms of health care and childbirth, one of Davis-Floyd's unique theoretical contributions. Technocratic beliefs, such as the body as machine and patient as object, give rise to the Western medical approach to childbirth. The humanistic model recognizes the influence of the mind on the body and seeks to "humanize technomedicine." The "heretical" holistic model views...