Like a video: The sexualisation of childbirth in Bolivia

Reproductive Health Matters

Volumn 6, Issue 12, 1998, Pages 50-56

  Bradby, Barbara ^a  

^a TRINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN   (Ireland)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; BODY POSITION; BOLIVIA; CHILDBIRTH; CLINICAL EXAMINATION; FEMALE; GYNECOLOGY; HEALTH CARE POLICY; HOSPITAL; HUMAN; MALE; MATERNAL TREATMENT; MATERNITY WARD; PRIORITY JOURNAL; RURAL AREA; SEXUALITY; TEACHING HOSPITAL; VAGINAL DELIVERY;

EID: 0031789303     PISSN: 09688080     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/S0968-8080(98)90007-6     Document Type: Article

References (12)

1. There are 21 internal reports of the project, listed in the Final Report, which is available on request from the author or the European Commission DGXII.
2. See GélisJ, 1991. A History of Cbil.dbirth: Fertility, Pregnancy and Birth in Early Modern Europe. Polity Press, Cambridge.
3. I prefer to use the Spanish sociodrama, rather than the English role-play, as the Spanish term emphasises the social process, the English one an individual role.
4. Translated from my field notes, originally written up in Spanish.
5. The use of the colloquial Bolivian Spanish, ya sabemos (now we know/are used to it), richly conveys the sense of both resignation and experience, contrasting this older woman's sensibility with the innocence/resistance of the young women who don't know/aren't used to it (no saben).
6. This impression was presumably based on previous experience of the maternity hospital.
7. Mulvey L, 1989. Visual and Other Pleasures. Macmillan, London.
8. See: Hagamos un Nuevo Trato. TAHIPAMU/Grupo de Solidaridad de El Alto, La Paz, 1994.
9. In Spanish, the colloquial expression used was usually meter mano, meaning to introduce the hand in a meddling sense, with something like the sexual connotation 'interfering' has in English. I have translated it (unsatisfactorily) as 'putting his hand up' or 'sticking his hand up'. The polite euphemism used by doctors was hacer facto which literally means 'to do the touch, the feeling'. A stronger word than both of these was often used, however, which was hurgar, meaning to poke, jab or thrust, with a figurative sense of stirring up or exciting. I have sometimes translated this as 'poking', which has both the intransitive and transitive uses of hurgar and similar sexual connotations. In Quechua the words we encountered were sat'iy, which means to put something where it should not be, and has connotations similar to those of meter or h urgar in Spanish; yaykuy, which means to enter or go inside; and jaywayfaiy, which means to reach inside for (and pull out). 10. Suverton, in her midwifery text, also acknowledges that vaginal examination on all fours 'may present some difficulties for the midwife in determining the fetal position, as the usual landmarks are in an unusual orientation'. See Silverton L, 1993. The Art and Science of Midwifery. Prentice Hall, London.
10. Arnold D, Yapita J et al, 1995. Maternidad traditional en el altiplano boliviano: las practices delparto en algunas comunidades aymaras. ILCA, La Paz. (Internal report of this project)
11. That is, with the man facing and on top of the woman.
12. I have analysed this at greater length elsewhere. See: - Bradby B, 1996. Will I return or not? Migrant women in Bolivia negotiate hospital birth. Paper presented to Sociological Association of Ireland Annual Conference, Dundalk, April, (forthcoming in Women's Studies International Forum) - Bradby B, 1998. Community participation in a reproductive health programme: from participation to dialogue. In Gender, Reproductive Health and Population Policies: Proceedings of a Workshop, Chiapas, Mexico, 1996. Health Action Information Network, Quezon City.