Childbirth

While childbirth is certainly a biological event, it also has a sociocultural component that has changed over time to reflect particular historical moments. At varying times childbirth has been a private affair undertaken by a woman alone, an intimate experience shared by two partners, and a grand social event involving friends and family. This shift over time can be seen to correspond to changes in society; the status of childbirth is closely linked with dominant views on how a society sees women and to some degree reflects the overall social standing of women at that time. In the U.S. context, the changing nature of childbirth is apparent. During the 1920s, childbirth became increasingly medical, moving from the home to the hospital. Many have cited the “assembly line” style of care that attended this move, and birthing women became a major commodity in the health care industry. This shift mirrored women's widespread move from the home to the workplace and captured the overall tenor of the time—commodification of women's labor. A [Page 184]similar phenomenon can be seen during the 1950s, when idealized white, middle-class women were embracing domesticity and were striving for lives of suburban disengagement.

During this time, hospital birth became centered on complete pain management. With the advent of highly medical interventions, childbirth became a nonevent, perpetuating the cultural ideals of modesty, privacy and isolation. Gaining popularity during the early to mid-20th century, women were given scopolamine (an amnesiac) together with morphine (an opiate), resulting in a state popularly known as twilight sleep. This practice fell out of favor as its negative impact on mothers and babies was demonstrated (ranging from women's nightmare birth recollections to infant and maternal death) and as medicalized birth advocates championed the reclamation of unmedicated birth.

The ways that a society conceives of and approaches childbirth reflects its broader conception of women and speaks to the social standing of women at the time.