Lying-in : a history of childbirth in America /

Lying-in : a history of childbirth in America /

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Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:	Wertz, Richard W.
Edition:	Expanded ed.
Imprint:	New Haven : Yale University Press, 1989.
Description:	1 online resource (xviii, 322 pages) : illustrations
Language:	English
Subject:	Obstetrics -- United States -- History. Childbirth -- United States -- History. Obstetrics -- Social aspects -- United States -- History. Maternal health services -- United States -- History. Delivery, Obstetric -- history. Midwifery -- history. Natural Childbirth -- history. Obstetrics -- history. Childbirth. Maternal health services. Obstetrics. Obstetrics -- Social aspects. United States. United States. History.
Format:	E-Resource Book
URL for this record:	http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/11114879

Hidden Bibliographic Details
Other authors / contributors:	Wertz, Dorothy C.
ISBN:	0585388229 9780585388229 0300040873 9780300040876 0300040881 9780300040883
Notes:	Includes bibliographical references (pages 304-314). English. Print version record.
Summary:	This lively history of childbirth begins with colonial days, when childbirth was a social event, and moves on to the gradual medicalization of childbirth in America as doctors forced midwives out of business and to the home birth movement of the 1980s. Widely praised when it was first published in 1977, the book has now been expanded to bring the story up to date. In a new chapter and epilogue, Richard and Dorothy Wertz discuss the recent focus on delivering perfect babies, with its emphasis on technology, prenatal testing, and Caesarean sections. They argue that there are many viable alternatives--including out of hospital births--in the search for the best birthing system.
Other form:	Print version: Wertz, Richard W. Lying-in. Expanded ed. New Haven : Yale University Press, 1989 0300040873

Description
Summary:	This lively history of childbirth begins with colonial days, when childbirth was a social event, and moves on to the gradual medicalization of childbirth in America as doctors forced midwives out of business and to the home-birth movement of the 1980's. Widely praised when it was first published in 1977, the book has now been expanded to bring the story up to date. In a new chapter and epilogue, Richard and Dorothy Wertz discuss the recent focus on delivering perfect babies, with its emphasis on technology, prenatal testing, and Caesarean sections. They argue that there are many viable alternatives-including out-of-hospital births-in the search for the best birthing system. Review of the first edition: "Highly readable, extensively documented, and well illustrated...A welcome addition to American social history and women's studies. It can also be read with profit by health planners, hospital administrators, 'consumers' of health care, and all those who are concerned with improving the circumstances associated with childbirth."-Claire Elizabeth Fox, bulletin of the History of Medicine "A fascinating, brilliantly documented history not merely of childbirth, but of men's attitudes towards women, the effect of a burgeoning medical profession on our very conception of maternity and motherhood, and the influence of religion on medical technology and science."-Thomas J. Cottle, Boston Globe "This superb book...is both an impeccably documented recitation of the chronological history of medical intervention in American childbirth and a sociological analysis of the various meanings given to childbirth by individuals, interested groups, and American society as a whole."-Barbara Howe, American Journal of Sociology
Physical Description:	1 online resource (xviii, 322 pages) : illustrations
Bibliography:	Includes bibliographical references (pages 304-314).
ISBN:	0585388229 9780585388229 0300040873 9780300040876 0300040881 9780300040883