Low expectations, sexual attitudes and knowledge: explaining teenage pregnancy and fertility in English communities. Insights from qualitative research

In the UK, youthful pregnancy and parenthood is considered an important social and healthproblem and is the focus of current government intervention. Contemporary policy approaches depict early unplanned pregnancy as a consequence of relative deprivation and a lack of opportunity, leading to 'low expectations' among youth, and as the result of sexual 'mixed messages' or poor knowledge about contraception. This small scale, qualitative study explores how well these explanations accord with accounts of pregnancy and motherhood provided by young mothers and Teenage Pregnancy Local Co-ordinators in diverse English localities. The results suggest that structural factors may be more important in explaining early pregnancy than those relating to sexual attitudes and knowledge. The tension between the idea of early motherhood as problematic, or even pathological, and early motherhood as rational is also considered

Perils to Pregnancies: On Social Sorrows and Strategies Surrounding Pregnancy Loss in Cameroon

Contains fulltext : 90807.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)This article explores the local perceptions and practices surrounding pregnancy loss in Cameroon-a topic that has long been neglected in international reproductive health debates. Based on extended periods of anthropological fieldwork in an urban and a rural setting in the East province of the country, it shows the inherent ambiguities that underlie pregnancies and their perceived dangers. By situating meanings of pregnancy loss within the complex dynamics of marriage and kinship, pregnant bodies are argued to be social bodies-the actions and interpretations of which shift along with social situations. This approach not only forms an alternative to the current focus on the body politic in global discourses on fertility risks but also shows how conventional assumptions such as the rigid distinction between voluntary and involuntary pregnancy loss distort ambiguous daily life realities for Cameroonian women whose pregnancies are not being carried to term